Anna Leigh Waters still hasn’t lost, Tyson McGuffin is still acting like it’s pledge week on Frat Row, Ben Johns is out and Connor Garnett is back in a final.
That about sums up San Clemente after Day 1 singles action as the PPA Tour goes from hot and humid Texas to cool and breezy California for the Orange County Cup.
The men’s draw opened up after losses by the top-two seeds – Johns and Federico Staksrud, and Garnett, who beat Staksrud in the quarterfinals, earned his way into a second Championship Sunday in the past three tournaments. He’ll face McGuffin Sunday for the gold.
Collin Shick, who has also made a final earlier this season, beat Johns in the second round before falling to McGuffin in the semifinals.
“Ben and Fed have been dominant,” Garnett said. “ It’s not that Ben and Fed are falling down, it’s just that a lot of others are elevating their play. If anything, there are more threats now, when before, it might have been just a couple guys.”
But you just have to think when Johns loses, and he earned the singles title last week in Texas, that the rest of the field kind of exhales. And when Staksrud fell, the tournament looked pretty open.
So, Garnett, the No. 7-seed, who made the final of the Atlanta Open back in May, will face McGuffin, who he beat in the quarterfinals of that same tournament.
And McGuffin, who made another semifinal – his fourth in the past five tournaments, might be playing his best pickleball. He’s 18-3 in his past five singles tournaments. He also was back in character, carrying on his “party-on” theme.
He called Shick “Shicky,” he “whoop-whooped” the crowd, gave a shout-out to the locals (like he always does, regardless of where he is on the globe as if required by contract with the Chamber of Commerce), and then asked no one particular if they wanted to watch him chug a beer.
He didn’t call anyone, “Bro,” and there was no secret handshake, but other than that, it was very “Frat night at the Alpha Beta House.”
“I’m going to focus on things I have control of, which is myself,” McGuffin said after his victory over Shick in the semifinals. “I’m happy to be moving on to Sunday.
“Hey, who wants to see me chug another Lite?”
And then there’s Waters, who hasn’t been beaten in any match since she came back from a short break in April. Waters was pushed to three games and held off a championship point from Lea Jansen last week in Texas. And Waters dropped the first game of her semifinal Thursday against Judit Castillo but rallied and won the next two. She’ll face second-seeded Catherine Parenteau in the final. Parenteau beat Anna Bright, making just her second singles showing of the season, in the semifinals.
“She’s very athletic,” Waters said of Castillo, after falling in the first game, 11-5. “I think I was going for too much.”
Garnett is making his second finals showing this season. In the semifinals, Garnett fell behind Pablo Tellez 5-0 in the first game, wound up with an around-the-post winner on game point in game one and closed out Tellez, 11-6, 11-4.
Garnett fell to J.W. Johnson in the Atlanta final but says he’s learned a few things since then.
“This is the first time I’ve been in one since that Championship Sunday. That takes the pressure off me. I’m just trying to go out there and have some fun. I was nervous and I didn’t realize it. I didn’t play any singles Friday or Saturday. Now I’m going to make sure I play some. You don’t really realize it if you haven’t been there before.”
Johnson lost to Tellez in the second round and stayed in the back-draw. He ended up earning fifth place with a 16-14 win against Staksrud.
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