Canada Wins Three Medals, Begins Team Competition at Pan American Championships by Whitney Fuller September 11, 2014 OTTAWA (ON)
– The Canadian Squash Team has won three medals so far at the Pan
American Squash Championships, and are looking to add two more as they
begin the Team competition. The Pan American Squash Championships are
taking place in Toluca, Mexico as part of the Pan American Sports
Festival leading up to the 2015 Pan American Games in Toronto.
Seven Canadian
athletes were in action in the individual draws, with the eighth team
member Andrew Schnell withdrawing due to injury. Shawn Delierre,
Shahier Razik, and Graeme Schnell were able to secure a few wins for
the Canadian men, but none were able to advance past the fourth
round. One the Women’s side, Hollie Naughton and Nikki Todd found
themselves out of contention earlier than anticipated with losses in
the second and third rounds, respectively. Danielle Letourneau fought
her way from an unseeded position to earn a berth in the semi-finals,
where she fell to second-seeded Samantha Teran of Mexico, 3-0 (11-2,
11-9, 11-6). Letourneau’s efforts were still enough to win her a bronze
medal.
Canada’s best finish
came off the work of Samantha Cornett, the Women’s Team number 1 and
top seed in the Women’s Individual event. Cornett worked her way to the
Women’s final with wins over Ashley Degroot of Guyana, Colombia’s
Catalina Pelaez and Americans Sabrina Sobhy and Olivia Blatchford. This
set up the first and second seed final against Teran. Always a
challenge playing a home crowd favourite in Mexico, Cornett lost the
final 3-1 (9-11, 11-4, 11-8, 11-3) to claim the silver medal for
Canada.
The Doubles events
brought Canada another bronze medal from the Women’s team of Danielle
Letourneau and Nikole Todd, who lost in the semi-finals to the eventual
Champions from Mexico. The teams of Schnell/Razik and Delierre/Naughton
also competed in the Men’s and Mixed Doubles events, but weren’t able
to find their way to the podium.
Podium hopes are still
alive in the team competitions, as Canada won all five Pool Play
matches on Thursday. The Women’s team, seeded third, had a busy day
defeating Peru, Brazil and Guatemala 3-0 each. On the Men’s side, 3/4
seed Canada defeated both Guatemala and Brazil 3-0. Both teams are now
onto the Quarter Finals, to be played Friday afternoon. The Canadian
Women will take on Colombia, while the Men await the winner of the
Colombia/Jamaica encounter.
The Pan American Squash Championships conclude on Saturday with the Team Competition Finals.
