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Netters leave for NPQ this morning
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Posted on Jun 14 2008
Fifteen of the CNMI’s top junior netters leave for Guam today to see action in the 2008 North Pacific Qualifier set to start tomorrow in the U.S. territory.
CNMI National Tennis coach Jeff Race said their team increased by one after the Oceania Tennis Federation requested Northern Mariana Islands Tennis Association to bring in one more player for the event.
Lucas Nutting thus joins Rafael Jones, Christian Miller, Jake Lee, and Daniel Camacho in the boys’ 13-and-under competition.
Other local bets seeing action in Guam this week are Russell Buenaventura, James Camacho, Benjie Decena, and Woo Suk Chang in the boys’ 18-and-under; Mayuko Arriola, Dina Jones, and Theecel Minor in the girls’ 18-and-under; and Thea Minor, Amy Arenovski, and Jean Bracken in the girls’ 13-and-under.
Race said he expects the singles portion of the 2008 NPQ to run from June 16 to 19 with doubles play set on Friday, June 20.
Conspicuously missing from the team is Vivien Lee, who finished runner-up to Arriola in last month’s 2008 DFS Micronesian Tennis Championships. Race said Lee didn’t had enough points to qualify for the event, after not playing in local NMITA tournaments for more than a year.
He, however, said Lee is always welcome to join future teams to the NPQ since she is a very good player.
The Top 3 finishers in the boys’ and girls 18-and-under and boys’ and girls’ 13-and-under advance to the 2008 Pacific Oceania Junior Championships in Lautoka, Fiji, next month.
The islands’ top junior player, Ji Hoon Heo, already has an automatic entry on the North Pacific Team this year and so will not play the NPQ, but instead head to Fiji then to New Caledonia for an ITF event.
