Tennis competition began today at the 2019 Western Canada Summer Games, hosted in Swift Current, SK. The tennis format for the games is both a team and an individual competition. In the team competition, each province faces off against the others in Davis-Cup-style multi-match ties. Each tie is comprised of seven matches: two boys singles, two girls singles, one boys doubles, one girls doubles, and one mixed doubles. Today, two team competition ties were completed.
Saskatchewan faced off against Alberta in their opening tie. Alberta came out on top with a final score of six matches to one. But, the Saskatchewan players fought hard and played well during their matches.
William Preciado and Austin Lin (our boys doubles team) scored the only match win for Team Sask today, with a hard-fought 4-6, 7-6(4), 10-6 battle over Alberta’s Arshot Bhatti and Aidan Rupien-Nazar. After dropping the first set, Will and Austin found themselves down 5-3 in the second, when they managed to break the Albertan team’s serve. At that point, a storm hit and the players were pulled off for a roughly 90-minute rain delay. After returning to the court late in the evening, our boys battled to take the second set in a tiebreak, and closed out the match in the deciding-set super tiebreak. Great work Will and Austin!
Also playing a tight match was Team Sask boys number one singles player Keegan Rice. Although he didn’t come away with a win today, he pushed Alberta number one Arthur McCarthy to a deciding-set super tiebreak. The final score in the match was 6-4, 1-6, 10-8.
Also in the team competition today, Manitoba secured a six-matches-to-one victory over the Northwest Territories.
Here is a list of all Saskatchewan match scores from today (Saskatchewan players in bold):
Arthur McCarthy def. Keegan Rice 6-4, 1-6, 10-8
Hana Gamracy def. Teah Chavez 7-5, 3-2 (Retired)
Kaetan Mehta def. Harry Lin 6-3, 6-2
Alexia Jacobs def. Erin Pitariu 6-0, 6-0
William Preciado/Austin Lin def. Arshot Bhatti/Aidan Rypien-Nazar 4-6, 7-6(4), 10-6
Gianna Oboniye/Aurora Pedwall def. Charlie McNeil/Jana Van Niekerk 6-0, 6-0
Nolan Sax/Emily Niers def. David Preciado/Nhu Nguyen-Quach 6-0, 6-1
To follow scores from the 2019 Western Canada Summer Games, you can view the event’s Tennis Canada Tournament Profile here: 2019 Western Canada Summer Games (TC) or you can view the official results page: 2019 Western Canada Summer Games (Official Results). Both will be updated periodically through the event.
We’ll be back tomorrow night to recap day two of tennis competition, where Team Saskatchewan will play two team ties against the Northwest Territories and Manitoba. Also on deck for tomorrow is the start of the individual competition.
Photo Credit: Matty O’Connell, Makewell Creative Co.