For forty-nine years many squashers have devoted the first weekend in January to the William White tournament at Merion Cricket. The date was randomly a boon to this year’s event when a recent push to bring in younger players shifted into high gear.
A record two hundred and forty-six players entered the Whitey’s fifteen draws. Many were in college and still on their winter break. They filled out a seventeen-team U25 doubles draw as well as thirty-two slots in the men’s singles open and thirty in the women’s open. (Colleges represented included Cornell, Princeton, Penn, Brown, F&M, Rochester and Hobart.)
Indeed, the two people sitting on either side of me at dinner were Peter Sopher and Dave Letourneau. Both seniors at Princeton. Another way to identify them is as Chapter Three and Chapter Eight of our new book, Run to the Roar.
In addition, Scott Brehman, Leo Pierce and the rest of the Whitey committee created an elite men’s draw for the crème de la crème, where Daryl Selby took out Gilly Lane in the finals. Historically, Philadelphia has had such an allergic reaction to pro squash singles (only one portable glass court event in the city’s history), so it was nice to see the area’s leading club encouraging pro squash (Selby is #10 in the world; Gilly #59)
Nowhere was the presence of so many younger people felt more than at the black-tie dinner dance. Normally, it is a lovely, crowded and slightly subdued affair: great conversation and plenty of room on the dance floor for such terpsichores like Dudy & Carter Fergusson. This year dress hemlines were drastically cut (what would Peach Farber, the magisterial leader of Merion’s dancing classes of old, thought?), bowties stubbornly remained untied and the floor was packed with swaying twenty-somethings moving to the relentlessly upbeat sound of CTO Fifth Avenue. Three hundred and forty-two people came to the dinner, a record not only for the Whitey but for Merion’s famous ballroom itself, which was supposed to max out at three hundred and twenty-five.
As usual, fascinating conversations. I talked to someone who had just gotten back from a couple of years in Beirut and someone else who went to a holiday party in Mexico that featured giraffes, rhinos and other animals of the African savanna and someone else who had been flashed by a braless woman at an intercollegiate match last season.
Two double-match point matches stuck out at the 2011 Whitey. In the quarterfinals of the men’s main draw, Noah Wimmer & Addison West saved a couple of match points after being down 2-0 to win 17-16 in the fifth over Dent Wilkins & Todd Ruth. In the finals of the men’s 40+, Rob Whitehouse & Geoff Kennedy were up 12-10 in the fifth against Eric Vlcek & Tom Harrity when a controversial call on an apparent winner made the score 12-11 rather than 13-10. Rob & Geoff squandered a couple of match points, and at 16-all Harrity put the ball away for a contentious victory.