DailySquashReport.com

Krizek And McElhinny Win Crescent Capital LA Open
by Rob Dinerman, for DailySquashReport.com

Dateline June 3rd, 2012 --- Trailing two games to one in the final round of the $10,000 Crescent Capital LA Open this afternoon in the last ranking tournament of the 2011-12 WDSA women’s professional squash doubles tour, 2011 U. S. National Doubles champions Narelle Krizek and her sister Natarsha McElhinny came up with a strong performance in the last two games en route to a 15-9 14-15 12-15 15-10 15-9 victory over Latasha Khan and Amanda Sobhy. It was the second consecutive time that Krizek has prevailed on the hosting Jonathan Club in downtown Los Angeles, as she and Suzie Pierrepont won the inaugural version of this tourney a year ago, also at the final-round expense of Khan and the reigning U. S. National and Intercollegiate Individuals champion Sobhy.

   Byed to the semifinal round of this six-team event by virtue of their top-seeded standing, Krizek and McElhinny triumphed in four solid games against Karen Jerome and Sarah West, five-game quarterfinal victors over Ivy Pochoda and Orla O’Doherty. Sobhy and Khan reached the final with a pair of four-gamers, first with Shirin Kaufman and Victoria Simmonds and then with second seeds Dana Betts and Carrie Hastings.

   They appeared in good position to win the final as well after the third game, but Krizek and McElhinny, eager to banish the memory of final-round losses in their last two partnering forays (namely the 2011 World Doubles and the 2012 U. S. National Doubles, at the hands of Seanna Keating and Steph Hewitt last spring and Hewitt and Meredeth Quick last month), managed to seize control fairly early on in both the fourth and fifth games and close them out in convincing fashion. The lone remaining event on the WDSA schedule, the Wilson Cup, is a non-ranking “special” event in which the top 16 ranked players will be paired up in an eight-team tournament, to be held in Southampton in mid-July.