Patel, Curtis win badminton city titles

Saumya Patel just wanted to have fun.

The Grade 12 student had yet to make a Crocus Plainsmen sports team, having been cut for soccer twice. He tried out for badminton last year, but didn’t make it, either.

Fast forward a year, and he not only cracked the roster, but won the varsity boys’ singles city championship on home court on Monday.

“There was kind of a motivation, but the goal was to have fun, not to win anything,” Patel said.

“I love the sport, so I never played to win, I just played because I love it.”

After being cut last year, Patel started playing badminton at the YMCA and stuck with it. The five-foot-eight righty developed into a crafty, agile player with the ability to extend rallies that seem hopeless and put them away with power when the moment is right.

He cruised through pool play, earning a spot in the semifinals.

Patel looked as though he may have finished one win shy of qualifying for provincials, down a game to Neelin’s Aiden Moore. But he battled back to win 2-1 (19-21, 21-19, 21-18).

“There was a lot of nerves there,” Patel said.

“He was a really unique player. He was essentially a doubles player. He used flat shots a lot and I never played a player like him before, so I had to adjust a lot. I tried a lot of stuff in the first set; that’s why I lost.

“But it gave me an idea of how to play the next two sets. That helped me win.”

The final was anticlimactic, as Neelin’s Eric Charbonneau went down with leg cramps and decided to default, trailing 10-8 in the first game.

Both are heading to provincials in Winnipeg on May 1-3.

“It’s really exciting. I just want to have as much fun as I can in high school, because I know university is going to be hard,” said Patel, who is headed to Ontario to study mechanical engineering at either Toronto Metropolitan or Waterloo next year.

“My expectations were to at least get top two. I ended up getting top one.”

CURTIS RUNS TABLE

Neelin’s Lettie Curtis thoroughly dominated the varsity girls event, winning eight games in a row en route to gold.

She went 4-0 in pool play, and swept Massey’s Komal Jirwan 2-0 (21-12, 22-20) to take the top spot.

“I was expecting a hard game. My opponent was great; she was a good player. I was expecting to be running around the court, essentially, a lot of cardio,” Curtis said.

This is one of Curtis’s favourite times of the year. Now in her third season of Neelin badminton and fifth overall, she relishes the opportunity to learn from the Spartans’ coaching staff, which includes Karl McDaniel, Lucien McDaniel, Jen Blair and Leonides McDaniel.

The sport has quickly grown on Curtis, who is off to provincials for the third straight year.

“How under-appreciated it is, is kind of cool, but also how much technique goes into it, the footwork, the swing and all the different types of shots,” she said.

“It’s a really cool thing you can continue to master forever.

“I really enjoy badminton and my coaches are amazing, so it’s generally a really fun season.”

Leonides is still on the team as well, competing in mixed doubles with Dana Linov.

But he arrived early to coach his peers every opportunity he had during the singles events.

“It’s awesome because he’s so young, but he’s such a good player and we’re really lucky to have him,” Curtis said.

“He’s a great guy and he’s always open to talking about your technique and literally anything about badminton. If you get him going, he’ll talk for hours.”

The three doubles events were still in progress at press time on Monday.

The junior varsity championships take place today at Crocus at 4 p.m.

» tfriesen@brandonsun.com