Arkansas Tennis Blog

Well what a time and the upsets have started. Congrats to Byron Cato and Jonesboro on winning State Championships and the Berth to Sectionals, now how are you going to fare once you lose your stud singles player within the next 48 hrs once the numbers are run. Also great playing by Ft Smith as well did not expect them to finish 2nd, congrats guys was fun to play you guys, Jim Anderson was a good representative of your team Jonesboro won the big match-up against Miller/Fairley winning 4-1 behind singles play and taking 2 MTB's in doubles. Jonesboro then beat Ft Smith 3-2 on Sunday to clinch winning both doubles, although #2 Singles with Bolds was much much closer than expected. They then took #1 Doubles in MTB, while losing MTB at #2 and being blown out at #3. Cato did a masterful job in the doubles mixing up team placement each match to keep teams guessing Arkansas 4.5 Men's Results Miller/Fairley 2-0 after Day 1 then the underdogs do it again with Ft Smith taking

So old days the biggest complaint has been the guys having to play a match on Friday and missing work because of a match schedule at noon and then nothing until Saturday, well the higher ups at ATA decided to go one further and scheduled not "1" but "2" matches on Friday. Should make for interesting line-ups on Friday So matches: Friday Noon: Birch v Cato Fairley/Miller v. Humbert/Stursma 4:30: Laster v Humbert/Stursma Fairley/Miller v. Birch Saturday 11:00 AM Humbert/Stursma v Cato Fairley/Miller v. Laster 5:00 PM Fairley/Miller v Cato Birch v. Laster Sunday 11:00 AM Humbert/Stursma v Birch Cato v. Laster Good luck to all and have fun on the courts

League Play has Finished and let the Games begin Assuming there will be a 5 Team Royal Rumble the weekend of June 6-8th Five Teams Fighting to Go To Sectionals Miller/Fairley: Cato/Jonesboro: Bolds has been DQ'ed to 5.0, believe it was a Dynamic DQ and not grievance Stursma/NWA: Laster/WATA: Birch/CLR:  Should be interesting will the 4 teams have their full line-ups for that inevitable Friday match that ATA loves to play on Friday for the guys at 11 AM or will the guys get lucky and get a 4PM start or later. Rumor: of 2 more players from unknown teams are currently being looked at, so teams could change some more. Also can anyone find the current DII signee on one of the teams. Any captains want to write their bio send a message, have some fun but nothing offensive

It appears the State Championships lineup is taking shape: Mid-Season Winner: Miller/Fairley is in NWA: Humbert-Stursma/Bella Vista/BV CLR: Miller/Fairley and Birch will fight it out this week, but both teams should advance into State -- Teams Split matches to finish season, good hard fought matches on both sides  NEA: No matches played, Cato added to 2 Memphis Players, which seem suspect at best but appear in rules as long as Bolds has not played College, although the 4.0 rating is an absolute joke. The 2nd team has more 4.0 players than 4.5, need a rule made that team requires 2/3 of players to be at level so jokes like this don't happen. Still need to play 3-4 matches by Monday WATA: Same as Jonesboro, Laster set to win but second team has more 4.0 than 4.5 players, another joke league. Still need to play 3-4 matches by Monday Independent: Kiker second team setup but 1 player signed-up, not sure I see how they will play 3-4 matches in this league to get qualified

Central Little Rock Well season finally winding down, 1 team is eliminated from contention now. Robinson sits at 0-4 and out of any chance of going to State Tournament after dropping Robinson dropped 2 5-0 decisions to Miller's Team Miller also defeated Kiker 3-2 losing the 2 singles matches before sweeping the doubles. Kiker is now on the ropes for a standing 8 count on their chances to make State out of CLR. They have a big match against Birch Thursday Night. A Birch win knocks Kiker out of the running and all but clinches a spot at State for Birch with 3 more matches to complete. There were a few additions over the last few weeks and subtractions. Birch: lost Hudson and Edens back to Jonesboro, even though Jonesboro still only has one team filled, the second team still has not registered any players, I hate this right now because it should throw up many red flags, the same thing is happening in Hot Springs as well. WATA is not much different with no matches being played.

Well not much to say other than Miller/Fairley dominated going 15-0 this weekend, very dominating. They were money in MTB going 5-0, including 2 in the Birch match and 2 in the Kiker match Birch took 2nd squeaking by Robinson in final match with MTB win at #3 doubles after dominating the singles lines. MVP for the weekend: Matt Ridgeway Jones 3-0 in dominating performances with the best win being a straight set shellacking of Guy Gilliland/Brent Herring, probably equals strike #1. Bynum Matthews as always solid in doubles winning with 3 different partners. Otto Fry also appears to be recovered from calf injury and put together 2 solid singles wins over the weekend beating Kyle Clem and Kevin Luneau handily. Eddie Bailey showed he is one of the best singles players in the state and puts any injury issues to rest for now. Interesting result was the Luneau/Toliver doubles team beating a solid Taunton/Martin team and then nearly clinching a win over Gilliland/Herring tandem. 2n

Well the annual tradition of playing a Mid-Season Tournament continues in Arkansas with the 4 Central Little Rock Teams being the only representatives this year, guess NWA and WATA decided to save their $150 and play with each other back home, more like beatdown their weaker step-brother to advance to State. So with that said lets look at matches: Match #1 2:00 PM Saturday Birch v. Kiker: Already played one full match with Birch winning 4-1, think will see the same score, Kiker may have a few more of their players this time, but so will Birch. 1st match Birch did not have a few big guns playing, such as Hoffmann, Gilliland, and Byrd. Expect them both to play as well as the addition of Herring who appears to be eligible by the skin of his teeth. Just do not see Kiker having any chance to pull this out. Doubtful the team will miss Lyon, Hudson or Edens for this match Miller v. Robinson: Much like the other match-up, see this one going 4-1 as well for Miller. Just do not see where Rob

Open up the League site on USTA and what do I see 2 new names on Birch's team. They are not in time for Mid-Season Tournament but will play regular season matches. Additions of Aaron Hudson and Matt Edens make the race for CLR very interesting as they now balance out the singles in many ways with Miller having Eddie Bailey and Patrick Murphy. Hudson and Edens can both play singles and will help out Hoffmann more than likely and allow Delco into the doubles line-up. Some strong possibilities now and some great match-ups could be headed to the LR Area Courts in the near future as Miller and Birch go to Battle. Excellent recruiting by Birch, but also opens the question will there be a Jonesboro League or do we see more defections from Jonesboro to a CLR team. Maybe Armstrong/Hunter go to Miller if room? Daniel Milnes, Huckabee, Harris where do they go?

IN CLR Birch beat Kiker 4-1. The match had 2 5.0 appeal downs playing one for each team and not surprisingly both won their respective matches. Brett Taunton teamed with Jonathan Martin to beat Birch/Bacon 2-6, 6-0, 10-8 @#1 doubles. Jason Lyon played with Stuart Jones at #2 to defeat Kiker/Anderson 6-4, 6-4 using late breaks in both sets to serve it out. Remaining Matches Brad Delco defeated Shaun Wiseman 1,0 Kyle Garretson (5.0 Bump down) beat Kyle Clem 4,2 #3D: Marquez/Jackson snuck by Nordentoft/Williams 5-7, 6-4, 10-7 In NWA Humbert-Stursma/Bella Vista/BV shutout Purkey 5-0 in two straight matches and have all but clinched a state berth, not playing mid-season Humbert is led by Appealed Andrew Todd, self-rate so will need to watch scores and any grievances, though think he may already have 2 strikes with consecutive straight set wins 1,1 and 1,2 The team has may solid doubles players in Humbert and Sturmas as well as Slaveski, but the big question as always will be will they

Time to make a comeback after being lazy for 2-3 yrs. Will start handicapping the 4.0/4.5/5.0 leagues as time and teams form in the near future. Should be fun!! 4.5 Men 18+ League Appears to be 10 teams across the state 4 in CLR, 2 NE, 2 NWA, 2 WATA, 2 Hot Springs/SWA   NWA: Appears Sturmsa-Humbert will be at State with convincing 5-0 wins already over their league mates 10:1 State Chances   NEA: Scott Hunter led team that appears to be stout. Hunter/Armstrong one of the best doubles teams, when they feel like playing. Aaron Hudson Willy LaFerney and Matt Edens are solid singles guys, Milnes/Cato/Owens good doubles, but who else will they add. Should have no issues advancing to state and one of the Top 3 right now even with slim roster 5:1 State Chances   Hot Springs : Kiker going the back way again this year playing 2 leagues and using Hot Springs to advance, should be similar to his CLR team. Good but just not strong enough to compete with the big guns of the state. 50:1