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Ferreira Bid for the Double Falls Short

Trailing two games to one in their opening match, second seeds Shane Coleman and Matt Jensen survived both that threat and subsequent early-match deficits in both the semifinal and final rounds as well to capture the 74th edition of the Gold Racquet Invitational at the Rockaway Hunting Club in Long Island, the longest continually running squash invitational in North America.

Byed to the quarters of the 14-team field, the two power-hitting Aussies culminated their three-match path to the title by surmounting a two/love final-round deficit against No. 1 seeds Michael Ferreira (who also lost his singles final to former Trinity teammate Reggie Schonborn just before the doubles final began) and Whitten Morris, who grudgingly ceded the concluding trio of games by a tally of 15-9, 11 and 11.

Morris, a Gold Racquet finalist last year with Mac McAndrew (when they lost to Morris Clothier and Eric Vlcek), and Ferreira had swept to victory in the Silver Racquet Invitational at Racquet & Tennis last month, and they came within a single game of duplicating that result this past weekend in Cedarhurst, where they motored past first Will Osnato and Hamed Anvari (first-round comeback winners from 0-2 vs. the Sebring brothers, Harrison and Marshall) in the quarters and then the Philadelphia pair (and late-1980's Gold Racquet and U. S. National champions) consisting of Dave Proctor and Geordie Lemmon in a four-game semi. Proctor and Lemmon had trailed last spring's U. S. Nationals A finalists Beau Buford and Geoff Kennedy 9-5 in the fifth in their quarterfinal before sharp-shooting their way through a 10-2 closing run to 15-11.

Meanwhile in the bottom half, Ryan O'Connell and Rich Sheppard strode to victory past first Kip Gould and Harrison Sebring (who subbed for an injured Steve Berliner) and the the R & T team of Ted Bruenner and Addison West to the semis. There they encountered the eventual champs, who as noted had endured considerable difficulty (and a 2-1 deficit) in their balancing quarter against Philadelphia Racquet Club torch-carriers Duncan Pearson and Greg Park. The latter duo had progressively out-played New Yorkers Michael Sabatine and Nick Barquin in the last two games of their 3-1 round of 16 win, but against Coleman and Jensen they were the ones who eventually wore down, as the final pair of single-digit stanzas ushered Coleman and Jensen into the semis.

They then dropped the first game against Sheppard (who won this event two years ago with Gregg Finn in a 3-2 final over Buford and Kennedy) and O'Connell before asserting themselves in the remainder of their 3-1 triumph. After falling behind yet again in losing the first two games of the final, Jensen and Coleman were able to grab four- and five-point early-game leads in the third, fourth and fifth and in each case managed to hold off a late Ferreira/Morris rally. Coleman has lived dangerously throughout the autumn, as witness the multiple-match-points that he and Scott Devoy had survived in both the fourth and fifth games of their Jimmy Dunn final against Park and Rob Whitehouse in Philadelphia two weeks ago. But both there and at Rockaway, Coleman and his partner have come through in the end.

FOUR MATCHES IN ONE DAY
The Coleman/Jensen comeback capped off what had to have been a doubly disappointing Sunday afternoon for Ferreira, who as mentioned ambitiously played in the singles tourney as well, where he similarly won a pair of convincing pre-final matches (at the expense of Awish Jayaswal and ISDA doubles standout and former PSA performer Scott Butcher) before similarly coming up just short in the final. His singles opponent, South African native Reggie Schonborn, had never defeated the British-born Ferreira and always played behind him in the line-up during their several early-2000's years together on Trinity's undefeated national-champion squads. Schonborn had sandwiched 3-0 wins over Chris Wyant and Dylan Patterson around a four-game victory over John Musto and he swiftly grabbed a 2-0 advantage against Ferreira in the final.

But Ferreira pridefully charged back to take the third game, leading to an exciting fourth that seesawed tautly to 10-all and stayed close throughout the end-game to 14-13, Schonborn, at which juncture a thrilling all-court exchange ended when Ferreira tinned a drop shot. Whether Ferreira's valiant, exhausting and barely unsuccessful attempt to rally from his 2-0 deficit wound up exacting a price in the immediately-following doubles final, or conversely, whether his concomitant participation in the doubles played any contributory role in his first-ever loss to Schonborn, is a matter of conjecture, though Ferreira's normally amazing fleetness of foot seemed less in evidence during the closing laps of the doubles final than it had earlier on in that match.

One noteworthy aspect of the doubles competition was the fact that all but one of the 28 competitors are currently based in either New York or Philadelphia. St. Louis, which was recently awarded the right to host the National Doubles later this season, did not send a single representative, nor did Baltimore, Boston, Buffalo or Toronto, all sites that will be holding important doubles tourneys this coming winter and all sites that have sent a plethora of teams to Rockaway in the past. The singles was similarly configured, with 13 of the 15 entrants coming from New York. Noteworthy as well was the terrific job that tournament co-chairs Peter MacGuire and Mark Hinckley did in all aspects of their organization and administration of this venerable and deservedly extremely popular invitational. They have worked in tandem for the past several years, carrying on the tradition with a style and efficiency that is fully the equal of their famed predecessors in the proud history of this championship.

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