July - August 1998
Vol. 9, No. 3

by Kevin Vicroy
Photo by Joe Bryska
Winnipeg Free Press

Greenfeld & Obremski

Winnipeg Hosts Pan American Games Preview

The 1998 Pan American Games Trials in Winnipeg, Canada seemed like an old- fashioned wedding as it played itself out from April 2-11 at the Duckworth Centre on the campus of the University of Winnipeg.

There was something old, something new and even something blue. To complete the rhyme, Venezuela’s Fabian Balmori had to borrow a racquet to play out the tournament after breaking both of his frames early in the week.

Old & New
Not that nine-time Canadian national singles champion Sherman Greenfeld is “something old” at 35-years of age, but his international presence has been felt for well over a decade. The Pan Am Trials – in his hometown – set the perfect stage for his control-style racquetball.

After four days of preliminary round-robin play to determine seeding for the single-elimination draw, the top four seeds shook out to include two Americans and two Canadians. However, current Mexican national champion and #5 seed Alvaro Beltran burst into the semifinals with a 15-11, 15-13 upset over Canada’s Mike Green. With the 19-year old’s victory, Mexico was represented in a singles semifinal at an international event of this calibre for the first time ever – definitely something new.

“For Mexico, this is a very big and special occasion because we’ve never made it to the semifinals before,” Beltran said.

The bottom bracket matched Greenfeld with the USA’s No. 2 player Michael Bronfeld. The steady Californian disposed of Mexico’s Javier Moreno 15-2, 15-7 in the quarters, while Greenfeld downed Venezuela’s Antonio Yamin by the same scores.

Top-seeded, then-current U.S. national champion Dan Obremski advanced past Balmori in the quarters by scores of 15-2, 15-9.

Televised live on a local Winnipeg station, Greenfeld took Bronfeld apart in the semifinal, 15-2, 15-6. The crafty Canuck seemed incapable of skipping the ball, while Bronfeld seemed equally incapable of putting it away.

“It was horrible,” Bronfeld said of the less than 35-minute match. “That’s about the worst I’ve ever played internationally. He lives for playing these matches with the TV going. What can I say? I congratulate him and I’ll get him next time.”

Greenfeld couldn’t help but be pleased with his performance. “The key was that I stayed tough, took one rally at a time and eliminated unforced errors. If he’s going to beat me, let him roll the ball. I think my game plan worked to perfection. It wasn’t the true Mike Bronfeld today, but I played well.”

The other semifinal match up offered the possibility of a momumental shocker. Up 13-5 in the first game, young Beltran began showing signs of fatigue and even the TV announcers noticed. Eyeing an opened door, Obremski stormed back to take the game 15-13 and continued into the second frame with a 15-9 win to close out the match.

“I was ahead and playing very well,” Beltran said. “Then Dan started coming back. I missed a couple of very important shots and lost my confidence. Dan took advantage of that.”

Experience proved to be the difference between these two shooters. “I think he got tired at 13-5 and I found a serve that worked,” Obremski said of the young Mexican. “I was bringing it in chest-high and he was trying to be too offensive with it. If he would have taken that Z serve to the ceiling and got me deep in the court, he probably would have won the first game and it would have gone to a tiebreaker.”

In the finals, the Winnipeg crowd never let Greenfeld lose his focus. The Canadian jumped out to a 4-0 lead only to see it turn into an 11-6 deficit. But Obremski couldn’t hold on and the local hero took the title with a 15-13, 15-7 win.

“The biggest factor in that match was me coming back in that first game. For me to lose the first game, the crowd would be out of it.” said Greenfeld. “For me to win that first game, in the fashion that I did, put him in a tough position going into the second game. Plus it got the crowd right back into it.”

After winning the Trials in ‘94, Greenfeld finished third at the ‘95 Pan Am Games. “This time around, I’m going to change the script,” he said. “I’m going to win the Trials and win the Games.”

Something Blue
She was dressed in red. Her flu-like symptoms and dehydration gave her a white appearance and a blue feeling. Even in her weakest moments, Michelle Gould was the ultimate American patriot. After cruising through the women’s bracket, giving up an average of just over one point per game, Gould met a familiar foe, teammate Cheryl Gudinas, in the finals.

Gudinas had just come off a convincing 15-4, 15-5 win over Canadian national titleholder Christie Van Hees in the semfinals. Still, Gould weathered her ill feelings to hold off Gudinas 15-13, 15-9.

“Michelle was very fatigued,” U.S. team trainer Kevin Brown said. “She played the match fatigued and slightly dehydrated because she was losing fluids from her body. She had flu-like symptoms and suffered from a very rapid heart beat.”

Gould was sent to the hospital immediately following the finals and hadn’t even realized that she’d won.

According to the Idaho native, “I would come off the court and Kevin would put ice on my back, trying to get my temperature to drop so that my heart rate would slow down. I don’t remember much about the match. About an hour after, Marc (Auerbach), our team leader, told me that I had won. I didn’t know.”

USA Doubles Its Pleasure
The U.S. National Team clinched the overall, men’s and women’s team titles as both doubles squads captured gold. Adam Karp and Bill Sell utilized late-game runs in both the first and second stanzas to defeat Canadians Mike Ceresia and Jacques Demers 15-9, 15-6.

“We went on a little run a the end of the first game and the second to close it out,” Karp said. “Up until those points, it was a battle. I don’t think anyone folded today, I just think Bill and I made the shots that we needed to make to pull away.”

Ceresia agreed, saying, “They played a lot better than we did in both games. Adam played the match of his life. There’s no way he could play like that again.”

USA’s identical twins Jackie Paraiso and Joy MacKenzie struggled to a 15-11 first-game win before thrashing the Canadian duo of Josee Grand’Maitre and Debbie Ward 15-1 in the second game.

“I think we were trying too hard in that first game,” Paraiso said. “(The Canadians) must have been watching, because they knew what shots we were going to hit. We had to readjust for that second game.”

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