Murray returning to court after two-year break

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 18/05/2018 (2926 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

After taking a two-year break from racquetball, Alex Murray is making her return to the court next week, and she’s doing it on a fairly large stage.

The 19-year-old Brandonite has registered to play in the Canadian senior racquetball championships. She’ll be in the women’s singles B/C combined division. After leaving the sport behind for two years to focus on her studies — she was in Grade 12 two years ago and was at Brandon University last year — the itch came to dig out her racket.

“It was nagging at me,” she said. “I was missing the sport a lot. It was really fun. I think for the most part it was not seeing my coaches and everything, all the people who put a lot of time and effort to get me to the level I had gotten to when I was playing competitively. I missed them a lot as well. That was a big part of it.”

Murray found a lot of success in racquetball before her hiatus.

In 2014, she finished second at junior nationals and represented Canada at the world junior racquetball championships in Colombia. She went winless in both singles and girls’ doubles there.

Eventually her desire to return to the court returned. She started practising but was too busy working to play in provincials. With nationals being so close in Winnipeg, she decided to give that a go.

What she wasn’t expecting was the respect the people who seeded the players gave her, as Murray enters the competition ranked No. 2, and earning a first-round bye in the 12-competitor field. Her first match will be on Thursday.

“I’m just kind of going in there and winging it this time,” said Murray, who had not looked at the seedings. “That’s interesting, I figured I’d come in down at the bottom again here.

“This go-around, I think I’m going to do it for the fun, be with everyone and have a good time. I know when I was in high school I was very nervous going into a lot of tournaments and felt a lot of pressure, but this time I think I’m just going to go and have fun. I haven’t been practising as much lately so I don’t expect as high an outcome as I would have when I was in high school.”

Ideally, Murray would have loved to team up with former partner Milana Paddock and play in the doubles portion of the event as well, but it just wasn’t in the cards this year. Doubles competition begins on Sunday and Murray will be in Barrie, Ont.

She’s moving there in the fall to study automotive business and will be in Barrie this weekend looking for a place to live before coming back to play. Moving away from Manitoba will make this national championship event — her first in the senior ranks — even more special for Murray as she knows she may not see some of her friends in the racquetball community for a long time.

“It won’t be the last time I see everyone, but I’m going back to school in the fall so it’s one last tournament for a little bit here,” she said.

Paddock would have loved to play doubles with Murray, one of her good friends, but focusing on singles play may benefit her as well.

The 22-year-old Brandonite prefers singles play and also takes photos for Racquetball Canada during the event.

She may also be a bit distracted since her brother, Max, is playing in the Memorial Cup — the Canadian major junior hockey championship — with the host Regina Pats while racquetball nationals are taking place.

Paddock’s first match of the tournament may be the most difficult as the eighth seed in the women’s singles B/C combined event wants to beat Gwen Smoluk in their contest, but also hopes to get off the court in time to watch Max, a goalie, and the Pats take on the Swift Current Broncos in a rematch of their Western Hockey League first-round playoff series. It’s also the last game of the round robin at the Memorial Cup.

“It’s going to suck on Wednesday because I know the Pats play on Wednesday and I play on Wednesday,” she said. “I wish I could be there to watch my brother play. Hopefully the Pats are doing really well and make the finals, but I’m going to miss that because I’m going to be away.

“I can’t drive five hours to Regina or fly on a private jet — I wish I had a private jet so I could fly to Regina quickly and watch a game and come back to Winnipeg overnight, but I don’t have that kind of money.”

This will be Paddock’s first trip to senior nationals — she has competed in junior ones in the past — and is coming in feeling pretty good about her play. She was the women’s singles A/B consolation champion and won the mixed doubles title with Evan Pritchard at provincials in April, which were also held at the Duckworth Centre.

Paddock, whose strength is her backhand and likes to get into opponents’ heads during matches, isn’t thinking about where she would like to finish. She knows she has a tough path. If she beats Smoluk then she faces top see Sue Macleod of Nova Scotia in the quarter-finals, someone she isn’t familiar with.

For Paddock, she’s just going to focus on her own game.

“That’s what racquetball means to me is working hard and being able to understand the sport and hoping to go for the finals on Saturday,” she said. “I try to do my best every game and work for it.”

Westman will also be represented at nationals by Carberry’s Teanna Letkeman and Brandonite Kurtis Cullen. Letkeman, who won the provincial women’s singles A/B title in April, enters women’s singles B/C combined as the fourth seed. She has a bye and won’t play till Thursday.

Cullen is teaming up with Tanner Prentice of Macrorie, Sask., for men’s doubles open action. They begin the eight-team consolation bracket event on Sunday against Trevor Webb and Lee Connell. The finals are slated for Tuesday.

He also is in the men’s singles open event and begins that competition on Wednesday when he meets Tommy Murray of St-Hubert, Que. Cullen is the eighth seed. The final will take place on May 26.

» cjaster@brandonsun.com

» Twitter: @jasterch