Recap

For those who have been missing Will these past few weeks and wondering where he was:

Interviewed after the awards ceremony, Will gave much of his credit to racquetball: I've learned to be patient, to wait for the opportunity, and then take my shot--and remember to not re-pinch a pinch. (Actually, Will seemed to think more of it came from hard work and some pretty bright minds, but we're not ones to miss out on a chance to plug racquetball, even if it means joining the ranks of professional journalists in fabricating quotes.) [for a slightly more accurate account of the event, see the article at Red Herring].

Jesse's wrist was feeling better, but he elected to give it more time to recover fully and to make a strong return next week. Hopefully Aaron will be back in playing trim next week too.

When we arrived at the courts, we found that someone from the racquetball community had woken up to learn that the new Arrillaga facility will not have racquetball courts, despite what the Capital Planning website says and The Stanford Daily has written. We encourage everyone in the racquetball club/community to write a letter of support and send it to him. Clearly on-campus facilies are vastly more convenient. We have also hedged our bets by starting to work with off-campus sites for possible arrangements. The posted letter:

   Posted on court doors:

The new courts at Arrillaga Family Rec Center are all going to be Squash courts!

If you want Racquetball courts, like I do, please email me right away, tell me how important Racquetball is to you and how often you play, and I'll forward your email to the proper Athletics people.

This is our only hope of keeping Racquetball on campus!!

- twz(at)Stanford.edu

Now back to the racquetball: Harvir and David led off with a quick match. David is moving fast and hitting precision shots. Harvir is focusing on getting his body turned to hit a good shot, but was a step slow in getting to the good passes or touch shots up in the front. Cut-throat was a good change of pace, requiring more accurate (lucky?) shots when you are the server, and requiring good communication and court coverage when playing with your partner as the receivers. The big thing in cut-throat and doubles is to stay alert during the rally, and to adjust your court coverage to balance against what your partner can cover.

Stay alert in doubles: Rule #1 in cut-throat and doubles is to stay alert during the rally. Adjust your court coverage to balance against what your partner can cover. If your partner moves up to get a pinch, move back and to the center to cover passes on either side, etc. (Rule #2 in doubles is to stay off the side wall--your coverage is terrible, and it is easy to get trapped, with nowhere to go.)   PS--email Matt (hills at tina.stanford.edu) if you want a copy of a DVD with some good local players playing doubles--you can watch their court positioning and their coverage for a good model of what you should be doing.

Jarnail started warming up as the cut-throat game tried to reach a resolution (David had originally been hoping for a game to 21). Harvir played him in singles and took a clean win. Any comments Harvir? Jarnail has a strong reliance upon kill shots into the corners from the service box and forward. He is hitting about 40% of these for winners, but most of the rest are skips. If kept in the back court, this threat is largely neutralized and the accuracy and pace on his passing game isn't usually applying enough pressure to carry the games from there. Aha--something to work on!

Next Monday the courts close at 7pm, and Matt is out of town. David, Harvir and Jarnail expressed interest in playing and should be posting to the racquetball mailing list with their plans. Sounds like there is also interest in playing next Wednesday too. See you all there!

Ladder Points

This table ranks players by club ladder points earned this evening.

Previous		Player	Today
Rank	Ladder Points		W-L	Ladder Points	Offense
1	95	Matt	3-1	+7	57
2	68	David	3-2	+10	65
5	28	Harvir	1-2	+4	30
7	26	Jarnail	0-3	+3	23

(*) Rank - the club rank at the start of play.
(*) Start Pts - the number of ladder points at the start of play.
(*) Earned Points - the number of ladder points earned this evening.
(*) Offense - Total points scored in games this evening

Game Log

Player A	Player B	Winner	Upset?	Score	Pts Earned
David	Harvir	David	--	15-9 (?)	David (+2) Harvir (+1)
Matt/David/Harvir		David	++	15-12-6	David (+4) Matt (+1) Harvir (+1) <== cut-throat (3-player) game
Harvir	Jarnail	Harvir	--	15-6	Harvir (+2) Jarnail (+1)
Matt	David	Matt	--	15-9	Matt (+2) David (+1)
Matt	Jarnail	Matt	--	15-9	Matt (+2) Jarnail (+1)
Matt	David	Matt	--	15-11	Matt (+2) David (+1)
David	Jarnail	David	--	15-8	David (+2) Jarnail (+1)

Upset - a (++) indicates that the lower-ranked player won