Virginia States

04/17/09 in Fredericksburg, VA

OPEN Division

Thanks to Harvey Brandt for the results.

The build-up for VA States this year was spicy, with talk of a new west coaster
 finally making it out to Fredericksburg, after years of threatening to venture
 eastward, and then bailing out, probably due to uterine cramps or something. The
 2009 edition of DDC drew 8 of the top 12 ranked players in the world, and most
 of those were pairing with a player of similar ranking.
 As always, weather was a big topic of conversation ahead of time, with rain in
 the forecast for the day of the event up until the week prior to April 17. Then
 the weatherman got his act together, and brought us a perfect day for DDC, with
 72 degrees and very light winds all day. 23 teams made it to this year's
 offering.
 Prelim play was to decide A & B pool play for subsequent rounds. In that round
 (5 pools), it was vital to be one of the top two teams out of the five pools. In
 that round, just one lower seed busted into the top ten, as Phil Delta Delta
 Cappa and Dale Crawford leapfrogged over John Elsner & Andy
 Lemann. Unfortunately, they t stand success, and Dale decided to go play golf in
 the afternoon, leaving the Top 10 with a missing team for the final 7 games of
 that round.
 As A-pool play moved into the later rounds, a few lower-seeded teams made their
 case to advance to the semis. Notably, Carlton Howard and Stew Hubbs beat Harvey
 Brandt and Randy Aiu. Eventually, a three-way tie between Harvey Brandt / Randy
 Aiu, Carlton Howard / Stewie Hubbs, and Mark Horn / Drew Preiss had to be broken
 by the traditional firewalk. Wait, it was the traditional point differential
 that determined who had to leave the island of the semis, and this time Carlton
 and Stewie were the odd men out.
 Conrad Damon and Jon Freedman avoided the attempted seed-busting by the would-be
 interlopers, and as winners of the 10-round decided to select Harvey & Randy as
 their opponent in the semis. Their calculus was based on the hard time doled out
 to the top three seeds by Horn/Preiss, who had all three higher seeds down 12-8
 before letting them each escape with a last minute win. (A less charitable
 journalist would say they snatched defeat from the jaws of victory). Had Mark
 and Drew won even one of those three games, Harvey / Randy were out of the semis
 and Carlton / Stew were in.
 What Conrad & Jon t count on was Randy & Harvey elevating their game to a thing
 of beauty. In three really hard-fought close games, Brandt/Aiu prevailed, and
 moved on to face Hesselberth/LeBeau in the final. Dave & Rick had won a close
 two-game set against Horn/Preiss, which could have gone either way. Mark and
 Drew were one of several east-west combo teams that acquitted themselves
 well. In fact, all four teams that made the semis were comprised of one west
 region and one east coast player.
 Going into the final, both teams had good momentum. Both teams had played 15
 games just to reach the finals, but Dave & Rick had the advantage of coming
 through their semi in only two games. Harvey and Randy went into the first side
 change with a 4-1 lead, but eventually the more rested Dave & Rick wore them
 down, taking the first game 15-13. In the second game, Rick got the backhand
 burn working and Dave kept Brandt/Aiu deep in their court time after time. Randy
 and Harvey were never able to make a serious run, with Dave & Quiche taking a
 15-5 victory for a sweep to the title.
 In the B-pool, Sam Kaye & Randy Lahm used their superior firepower to dominate
 the pool, losing just one game of nine. Elevating from several seeds below, Beth
 Verish and Lori Daniels had an amazing 8 game winning streak, finishing with
 just one loss themselves. Not only did they win the s division, but they tied
 Sam & Randy for the best record in the B-pool. The ladies finished in 12th
 place, owing to the tiebreaker
  loss to the Sam & Randy.