ISDA Squash Tour 2012

Tournament Results:

Mudge And Berg Triumph In North American Open by Rob Dinerman

A tournament that had gone 100% to form throughout its 14 pre-final matches (only two of which had even exceeded the three-game minimum) concluded with a lower seed finally prevailing in the most important match of all when second seeds Damien Mudge and Viktor Berg earned a 15-11 16-14 11-15 15-7 final-round victory over defending champs and top seeds Paul Price and Ben Gould Sunday afternoon at the Round Hill Club in Greenwich, CT. The outcome marked both a return to the winner’s circle of this coveted tourney (which marked its silver anniversary with this year’s edition) for Mudge (who won this event with Gary Waite for seven straight years from 2000-2006 before they were edged out by Price/Gould in last year’s final, in which Waite/Mudge led 2-0 and 13-12 in both the third and fourth games) and a career highlight for Berg, previously an Open finalist with Willie Hosey in 2002 and with Chris Walker in 2006. It also enabled Mudge and Berg, who are now two for two in calendar 2008 after their triumph in Boston two weeks ago, to replace Price and Gould as the No. 1 team in the upcoming ISDA rankings set to be released later this week. Never in the eight-year history of the ISDA have as many as three teams occupied the No. 1 slot prior to this season, in which Walker and Clive Leach briefly displaced Price and Gould in late autumn before Price/Gould regained that slot, only to now, at least for the time being, have surrendered it to Mudge and Berg. Mudge, who was a right-waller for all those years with Waite before moving to the left just this season to partner up with Berg, also thereby became the only player ever other than Waite (who played the right wall when he and Scott Dulmage took this event in 1994) to capture a North American Open crown on each wall. The course of the final may have been slightly influenced by the markedly different course of the two respective semis (Price/Gould were seriously challenged in their lengthy and brutally competitive 15-13 17-15 14-17 15-7 match against Walker/Leach, the seventh clash already this season between these two fierce rivals, while Mudge/Berg won much more easily over John Russell and Preston Quick) and was definitely affected by the significant ankle sprain Price incurred with his team ahead 10-7 in the first game. When play resumed after a five-minute stoppage, Mudge and Berg took off on an 8-1 burst to close out that game, after which Price had the ankle professionally taped up and seemed closer to his pre-injury mobility after that. Of the four semifinalists, only Russell and Quick were forced beyond a third game in the first two rounds, that coming in their quarterfinal against Joe Pentland and Mark Price, who for the third straight time were overtaken down the stretch by the Russell/Quick tandem. In St. Louis, Pentland/Price were up 12-7 in the fifth but lost eight points in a row; in Boston, they led 2-1, 14-10 but failed to convert any of that quintet of match-points; and in Greenwich this past weekend, they led two games to one but again could not hold the Russell/Quick rally off. In the remaining quarters, Walker and Leach out-played Michael Pirnak and Mark Chaloner; Mudge and Berg did the same to Steve Scharff and Ayman Karim; and Price and Gould had too much firepower for five-time North American Open finalist (in ’00 and ’01 with Jamie Bentley, in ’02 with Berg, in ’03 with Pirnak and in ’05 with Leach) Willie Hosey and Matt Jenson.

Draw