Monday, November 22, 2010

JSM Illinois Challenger Final Day: No titles for Illini

It was close, but there were no titles for the home team at the JSM Illinois Challenger as two former Fighting Illini fell in matches that went the distance.

Doubles was first up and the final matched featured the top-seeded team of former Illini Ryler DeHeart and Pierre-Ludovic Duclos playing against the third-seeded Raven Klaasen and Izak van der Merwe.  The first set was a 6-4 finish for the higher seeds, but the second was quite a battle.  It finally finished in a 14-12 tiebreaker for Klaasen and van der Merwe, leading to a match tiebreaker for the third set.   The momentum continued for the South African duo and they had their second championship of the year.

The singles final was not unlike the doubles in that it also went three sets. 
DeHeart’s former teammate Amer Delic, who was coming off a year-long recovery from knee surgery, pulled out a breaker in the first over sixth-seeded Alex Bogomolov, but missed it (10/8) in the second.  The third set then went 6-3 to Bogomolov and Delic lost his chance of repeating his 2006 title. 

Even though he was certainly disappointed,
Delic wasn’t dwelling on it, “This week has been a success and now it's just time to build on it. It's a good way to end the year."
For full draws and results visit the official website for the JSM Illinois Challenger.
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