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.
