Men's squash falls to Trinity 5-4 in national championship

The two teams had been on a collision course all season. Both Princeton and Trinity stormed through the opening rounds of the tournament, dropping only one individual match between them in the first two rounds. With expectations for the match set so high, the Sunday showdown did not disappoint the capacity crowd.

One week ago, Princeton had dropped a gut-wrenchingly close 5-4 match to Trinity in its regular-season finale. This time, the individual matches were even closer, as the teams battled for more than six hours in what both head coaches described as one of the best college squash matches they had ever seen.

With all but one match completed and the overall score knotted at four, all eyes turned to Court No. 1 for the deciding matchup at No. 1 between Trinity’s Baset Chaudhry, the defending individual national champion, and Princeton’s senior and tri-captain Mauricio Sanchez. Last weekend, Sanchez defeated Chaudhry in a match for the first time ever, and, once again, the speedy Sanchez stood toe-to-toe with the mammoth Chaudhry. This time, Sanchez came up just short, losing his five-game match in heartbreaking fashion.

“He’s a good player. He’s really powerful, and his drives are difficult to attack,” Sanchez said of his opponent. “He’s quite physical and has great overall skill.”

After the first four games were split, the national championship hinged on the fifth and final game between the nation’s two top-ranked squash players. Sanchez jumped to a 5-0 lead before Chaudhry began to claw his way back.

“I just wanted to play a high pace. It worked until I was up 5-0 [in the fifth game],” Sanchez said. “I kept on trying to do the same thing, but it stopped working.”

The final four points for Sanchez would prove elusive as Chaudhry shut the door on him, taking the fifth game 9-5 to clinch Trinity’s 11th consecutive national title and setting off a Bantam celebration.

“We worked really hard all season and came really close twice,” Sanchez said. “It’s a shame we didn’t win. We did all we could to get as close as we could.”

The Tigers’ best opportunity to win the title might have come in the penultimate match of the day. With Princeton up 4-3, sophomore No. 4 Dave Letourneau won the first two games and held a 7-5 lead in the third game against Trinity’s Parth Sharma, who had defeated Letourneau 3-1 the weekend before. Just when the national title was within the Tigers’ grasp, Letourneau, who has been plagued by injuries throughout the season, fell on the court while diving for a shot. Sharma then posted a 13-point run to extend the match to a fifth game. Once again, Letourneau was two points from victory, serving with the score tied at seven. Yet Sharma would again prove too strong, taking the individual match with a 9-7 fifth game and tying the team match at four.

Princeton had gained a 4-3 edge off the racket of freshman No. 7 Kelly Shannon, who fell behind 2-0 in games before catching fire and rattling off three consecutive games in rapid succession for the 3-2 win.

The match was played in three shifts. The first and second shifts yielded the same result as last weekend, with the teams splitting six matches for a 3-3 tie. In the first shift, freshman No. 3 Chris Callis ran out of gas against Manek Mathur in a 3-2 loss, while sophomore No. 9 Peter Sopher reversed his result from the regular season finale, pulling out a gutsy 3-1 win against Rushabh Vora.

That meant the matchup between senior No. 6 and tri-captain Hesham El Halaby and Trinity’s Supreet Singh would determine which team took the early lead. In a back and forth match, El Halaby overcame cramping to win his final home match 3-2 in front of a rowdy group of fans.

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“The match was really tight from the start. He had a 4-1 lead in the third game [with the match tied at one], and I got lucky that he started bleeding and had to take a break to wrap up his knee. That was enough for me to get a second wind,” El Halaby said. “The fifth game was all I had to play for. I just had to push as hard as I could. I had a sizeable lead, and that gave me a cushion to go for riskier shots.”

The second shift of matches unfolded in the exact same manner as the last time Trinity and Princeton met. Junior No. 5 David Canner was the bright spot, taking home a 3-1 win against Randy Lim. In the other two matches, junior No. 8 Santiago Imberton fell 3-0 to Vikram Malhotra, and senior No. 2 and tri-captain Kimlee Wong fell 3-2 to his nemesis, Gustav Detter.

After a 3-0 loss to Detter last weekend, Wong entered the final with a much clearer game plan.

“I came in knowing what I needed to do. Last week, I was a little too gung-ho. This time, I had a clear head, and I knew that I needed to play a slow pace,” Wong said. “[Detter] is fitter than I am. I needed to win the third game. I went up 4-1, and then something clicked in his head. He started anticipating what I was doing, and the rallies became longer, which was not to my advantage.”

The loss is the final home match for Princeton’s senior tri-captains: Sanchez, Wong and El Halaby, popularly dubbed “The Three Amigos.”

“We knew they were going to be special when they came to Princeton,” head coach Bob Callahan ’77 said. “Not only are they special players, but they are special leaders and people. It’s been a wonderful four years for me. It will be very hard to come back next year without them. They will be sorely missed but never forgotten.”

Though the result left the Princeton squad with downtrodden looks as they walked off the court, the Tigers have much to be proud of as they look back on their fourth straight loss to Trinity in the national championship.

“I told the team that champions are what’s on the inside, not just on the outside,” Callahan said. “They are champions in every right. Just because you don’t have the biggest piece of silver doesn’t mean you don’t have honor and class.”