Tournament Results:
Walker And Chaloner Are Wilmington Winners By Rob Dinerman
Dec 6th --- Trailing two games to love and later down 10-6 in the fourth, top seeds Chris Walker and Mark Chaloner pridefully rallied to a riveting and historic 10-15 8-15 15-9 15-12 16-15 victory over young lions (and first-time partners) Jonny Smith and Yvain Badan Saturday evening in the final round of the 16th annual U. S. Pro Championships, hosted as always by the Wilmington Country Club. Never before in the nearly 10-year history of the ISDA (which was founded in January 2000) had a final-round match been resolved in a simultaneous-championship-point scenario, and the outcome of that ultimate exchange, which took place just over two hours after the titanic struggle began, was emphatically determined when Walker buried a razor-sharp forehand reverse corner which barely eluded Smith’s desperate diving attempt to steer it back into play.
Ironically, Walker had memorably tinned the exact same shot-attempt two years ago on the same court at 13-14 in the fifth in an ’07 semi against eventual champs Viktor Berg and Damien Mudge after Walker and his partner at the time, Clive Leach, had rallied almost all the way back from a 9-14 deficit. When reminded of that moment during the post-final cocktail party, Walker noted that the different outcome had largely stemmed from the fact that this time he had hit the shot with much more conviction than had been the case back in ’07.
As noted by the match’s undulating stat line, all of the conviction evinced during the early going had come from former Trinity teammates Smith (Walker’s right-wall partner throughout the 2008-09 ISDA tour and even at the Briggs Cup this past October before recently returning to his favored position on the left wall) and Badan, who had out-played the British compatriots Walker and Chaloner with the same meat-grinder ruthlessness that had previously characterized their quarterfinal with Rob Dinerman and Rob Whitehouse and their semi with John White (who stepped in when Dave Rosen withdrew with a back injury) and Tom Harrity, first-round four-game winners over St. Louis Challenger champs Mark Price and Raj Nanda, who hit many more tins than his team had any chance of sustaining during the last few games.
Meanwhile, Walker and Chaloner had encountered unforeseen and substantial resistance in their four-game opening round encounter with Tournament Chairman Ed Chilton (the host club’s head pro for the past 19 years and, with Joyce Davenport, the current holder of the U. S. 40-and-over Mixed Doubles title) and Penn women’s coach Jack Wyant, who won the first game in a tiebreaker and forced the third to a tiebreaker session as well. Chilton in particular played exceptionally well both in that match and in his march with Dinerman through the highly competitive Tim Chilton U. S. Pro-Am Championship event, named in honor of Ed’s father, who passed away four years ago. They won all four of their matches in four close games, going undefeated in a combined four tiebreakers, and defeating Carl Baglio and Scott Simonton in the final.
After finally closing out Chilton and Wyant, Walker and Chaloner wore down Tim Porter and Greg Park in a similar four (again dropping the first game) and, as noted, managed, eventually and by the barest of margins, to overtake Smith and Badan. From 6-10 in the fourth game, they conjured up a 15-4 run to 6-2 in the fifth, but Smith/Badan swiftly evened the score, leading to a seesawing series of torturously demanding all-court points, with all four superbly conditioned contestants fully meeting the increasing exigencies of the moment literally to the last possible moment, at which all-or-nothing juncture, Walker produced the defining salvo and brandished his fist in richly-deserved exultation.