WSDA Update: Betts/Hewitt Shock Grainger/Pierrepont, Will Face Tippett Sisters In NYC Open Final Tonight   
by Rob Dinerman

Steph Hewitt, Dana Betts, Natalie Grainger, Suzie Pierrepont


Narelle Krizek, Tarsh McElhinny, Tina Rix, Fernanda Rocha

Dateline November 22nd --- Trailing 13-9 in the opening game against their heavily-favored first-time-partnering opponents, Dana Betts and Steph Hewitt staged a 6-1 run to win that game and then even more surprisingly dominated the single-figure third and close-out fourth to score an eyebrow-raising but decisive 15-14, 9-15, 15-8, 15-8 victory over Natalie Grainger and Suzie Pierrepont this afternoon in the semifinal round of the inaugural $17,500 New York City Open before an enthralled gallery at the University Club of New York. Betts and Hewitt, winners of the Cincinnati Open and St. Louis Open last season, will face the top-seeded Tippett sisters, Narelle Krizek and Tarsh McElhinny, who similarly pulled off a rally (from 12-13 to 15-13) late in the first game and never looked back in rolling to a downhill 15-13, 15-7, 15-5 win over Tina Rix and Fernanda Rocha in the other semi, in a Monday evening final.

   Hewitt and McElhinny both were solid, virtually error-free and wonderful both defensively and in the depth they achieved --- but the day really belonged to the on-fire left-wallers Betts and Krizek, both of whom amassed a slew of front-court untouchables that accounted for a vast majority of their respective teams’ points. The left-handed Betts was blasting her forehand rail, keeping the ball so low that Grainger was having to try, too often unsuccessfully, to dig it out of the splinters of the newly-re-floored court of the host venue, which also raised the ceiling considerably. One additional aspect of the substantial renovation that the court underwent this past summer is that the front wall appears to be “slower” than in the past, which took some of the edge off Pierrepont’s power and gave Betts, as well as Hewitt (who slipped in a number of tight forehand reverse-corner winners as the match progressed) more room and time to operate.

   After faltering the way they did in letting their late lead and double-game-ball opportunity slip away at the end of the first game (on a shallow Hewitt straight drop, followed by a Betts cross-court that handcuffed Pierrepont), Grainger and Pierrepont appeared to assert themselves in handily winning the second, which was the one game in which both Betts and Hewitt committed a number of tins. But Betts hit a trio of winners out of the gate in the third and her hot streak never slackened in that game or the fourth, while Grainger and Pierrepont increasingly seemed out of answers and, much earlier than anyone expected, out of the match, which ended on a despairing backhand reverse-corner mid-tin by Grainger followed by the last of a host of nick-finding salvos off Betts’s hot racquet on match-ball.

   As sharp as Betts had been in the first match, and as in-sync as she was with her partner Hewitt, Krizek was at least as lethal in the second match, due both to her own precise and multi-front shot production and to the manner in which McElhinny’s wonderfully-placed lobs intermixed with un-volleyable skid-boasts consistently chased Rix to the deep recesses and opened up the court for Krizek to attack. The sisters have frequently alternated court positions but for this event have settled for an alignment in which Krizek is on the left wall and in this match she got to roam behind her older sister and hit plenty of forehands, often with better shot-making angles than would have been afforded her had she been on the right.

   The fact that Rix and Rocha’s had endured by far the most grueling quarterfinal (a four-gamer with Tara Mullins and Tehani Guruge featuring a great left-wall battle between Mullins and Rix in which the Rix/Rocha pairing had fended off double-game-ball-against in two of the games they won) may have played a role in the course of this semifinal as well. In any event, after seeing their 13-12 first-game lead give way to a trio of game-clinching Krizek winners, Rix and Rocha fell well behind early in the second and never were able to mount a comeback bid. Krizek then hit winners, all of them on different shots, on each of the third game’s first five points, including a spectacular play in which she tracked down a well-hit Rocha Philadelphia boast and cracked an on-the-run forehand three-wall that dead-rolled out of the left wall nick. Krizek hit eight winners that game, which, however, ended on a forehand three-wall nick by McElhinny that ended the day on a dramatic note and set the stage for what should be an excellent Monday-evening final.

Tournament Recap:

Quarterfinals: Narelle Krizek/Tarsh McElhinny d. Nabilla Ariffin/Joyce Davenport, 3-0; Tina Rix/Fernanda Rocha d. Tara Mullins/Tehani Guruge, 3-1; Natalie Grainger/Suzie Pierrepont d Nikole Garon/Vic Simmonds, 3-1; Dana Betts/Steph Hewitt d. Seanna Keating/Nikki Todd, 3-0.


Semis: Krizek/McElhinny d. Rix/Rocha, 3-0; Betts/Hewitt d. Grainger/Pierrepont, 3-1.