This years Hickey Cup drew a small contingent of local players. Five of our players were fresh off the Junior Nationals, and ready for more singles play. Only one of the adult players in Aiken could be convinced to try their hand at singles, most of our players prefer the more causal pace of doubles play.
In the opening match Zach Harrington, age 13, defeated Francois Verglas in a thriller 6/5 5/6 6/5. Alex Handy won in a walk over against Charles Bostwick, who came down with the flu just a day before the event was to start. Meanwhile, Dana Kopald defeated Hope Blalock quite handily, and Zach Harrington continued his winning ways with a 6/1 6/1 victory over Alex Handy.
In the consolation final Francois Ferglas defeated Alex Handy 6/5 5/6 6/4. The finals pitted Zach Harrington against Dana Kopald. Zach took the opening set 6/1, as he controlled the service side with an overhead spinning serve that Dana had a hard time reading and reacting to. Dana turned the second set around, went up 3-1 before Zach came back and tied it at four all. Dana won the next critical game involving 3 chases, and each player defending a game point. Dana with the momentum on her side closed out the set 6/4. At one set each the players exerted control of the service side, they were never more the 1 game apart as the score became knotted at 5 all. Dana was on the hazard side, she laid down a chase 1and 2 at 30 all, she forced Zach to make a racket error with a nice force to the dedans, up 40 -30. The players then changed sides, Zach made a valiant effort to cut the ball on Dana’s serve, it landed at better then 2. Game set match and The Hickey Cup 2009 to Dana Kopald.
