Fort Worth Men's Tennis

Fall Team Numbers are now available to Captains
Captains can access the Fall League team numbers in the Captains' Area. To alleviate confusion, please note that the fall league is being played under the 2011 Championship Year even though it is Fall 2010. This is why the mid-year ratings are know as Early Start Ratings.

Early Start (Mid-Year) Ratings Are Now Available
The 2010 Early Start (Mid-Year) ratings have been published on the USTA-Texas website. These ratings are only for the fall season (not Combo or Super Seniors). These ratings are not used for tournament play (tournaments use the 2009 year-end ratings). Further, the list only shows players who have a change in their rating (up or down). If you do not appear on the list then your rating did not change.

Click here for men's ratings.

To appeal your rating go to www.texas.usta.com and click on the Early Start Ratings header (this can also be found under the Adult Leagues menu). Instructions will be found on that page.

Super Senior League
Schedules for the 2010 Super Senior league are now available on this site and on TennisLink.

The list of Super Senior (60+) eligible players has been posted in the captains area of this website.

There is a consideration to move this league from the heat of the summer to the cooler spring. However, to do this we would make this league be a SUNDAY league. Please forward opinions about this move to the league coordinator.

Fort Worth 8.0 Senior Mixed heading to Nationals
The 8.0 Senior Mixed Doubles team captained by Bill Stetzer defeated Austin today, Sunday, June 13th, in Amarillo in the finals of the Sectional Championships by a score of 2-1. To get to the finals they defeated teams from San Antonio (3-0), Amarillo (2-1) and Midland (3-0) to advance to the semi-finals. In the semi's they defeated Dallas (3-0) in a close match taking two lines to a third set tie-break. The team members competing at Sectionals were: Bill Stetzer, Skip Butler, Bob Barrie, Darrell McCallum, Frank Carpenter, Susan Hull, Martha Benson, Cheryl Halpern, Gina Tallent

News about John Mixon
3/28/2010
I received the following message from Marc Klamecki, captain of the Flower Mound LJP 4.0 team:
"We had a serious situation today in Flower Mound. John Mixon the captain of the TCU Men's 4.0 team suffered a heart attack during our league make-up match today. John's team acted heroically in administering CPR and were commended by the EMS personnel. Even though we were able to get immediate help from Flower Mound EMS, the damage to John's heart was massive... Apparently he had suffered from a heart attack twice before".
UPDATE 3/31/2010
John passed away this morning before his family had to make any decision about life support. They plan to have a private service soon and a celebration of John's life with his friends at a later date.
More information will be placed here as it becomes available.

Fort Worth 4.0 and Under Men take the Title at the
Tri-Level Sectionals
Cade Tims captained the Fort Worth men through a five team round robin to win the Sectional Championship. Team Tims defeated teams from Dallas (3-0), College Station (3-0) and SETX (3-0) while losing to Amarillo (1-2) to enter a three way tie for first at 3-1 with Amarillo and College Station. Fort Worth won by having one additional individual win over Amarillo (10-9) to win the event.

Teams Pham, Hudnall, Tims and Miller
win Tri-Level 2010
Fighting the frigid temperatures of the coldest weekend in 14 years, Fort Worth tennis players competed in the 2010 Tri-Level League tournament at Arlington Tennis Center. To concentrate play into the warmest parts of the weekend, teams played 2 out of 3 match (10-point) tie-breaks. Team Pham won the women's 3.5-4.0-4.5 division with an undefeated record. Team Hudnall won their 3.0-3.5-4.0 division flight to advance to the semi-finals and then the finals. Teams Tims and Miller won their respective divisions as well. Each of these teams will represent Fort Worth in the Tri-Level Sectionals in Kingwood in February.

Effect of Ratings on Fort Worth Men's League
According to the USTA, 30% of the players across the nation (90,000) were bumped up in rating with the recent publication of the year-end ratings. Unfortunately for the men in Fort Worth, the percentage is even higher - 35% or 293 Fort Worth men were bumped in rating. Of the 101 self-rated players in the men's league, 42 (39%) were bumped up. View a level by level calculation of these ratings here.

Year-End Ratings
Click here to find your rating
(A message from the USTA)
The year end 2009 NTRP ratings will reflect a nationwide movement in which a higher percentage of players will move upward this year. This reflects the concerns of the National Oversight Group, the Observers (Verifiers), charged with protecting the integrity of our NTRP levels as defined below. It was also the clear consensus of many others including staff, volunteers, team captains and players that the system is in need of adjustment as too many players were above the NTRP level they were playing at. Additionally, the same issue was noted through player concerns raised in survey work. A growing disconnect was seen between the standards used in the Self Rating guidelines and the actual characteristics of players on court at various levels, along with players who had been allowed for many years to appeal their year end ratings downward.

Of the 300,000+ league players nationally, more than 90,000 will be seeing movement in their NTRP rating that should coincide with their appropriate skills. With almost a third of the players seeing movement, please know that if you are in this group, you will not be alone. We recognize that there may be initial concerns and questions, but we believe rating adjustments are necessary to protect the integrity of the NTRP and insure that the vast majority of all league players will have competitive matches.

Fort Worth 9.0 MXD Doubles:
National Champions
in Las Vegas
The 9.0 Mixed Doubles team out of River Crest Country Club, captained by Rafael Omana, travelled to Las Vegas Nov 20-22 to compete in the National Championships. They won their flight by defeating teams from Southern (2-1), the Northern (2-1) and New England (3-0). The advanced to the semi-finals to defeat Midwest (3-0). They then beat Eastern (2-1) in the finals to become National Champions. The players competing in Las Vegas were Rafael Omana (captain), Kim Steinberg, Brad Ibbott, Cherrie Hamilton, Ricardo Omana, Margery Berry, Jason Moore, Melissa Staniford, Cynthia Llewellyn and Paul Haley.

Fort Worth vs Fort Worth at Super Senior 8.0 Sectionals
Fort Worth, Captained by Mike McBurney, defeated Wild Fort Worth, captained by George Meyer, in the 2009 Super Senior 8.0 Sectional Finals by a score of 2-1. Fort Worth advanced to the championship rounds by defeating San Antonio (3-0), NETX (3-0) and Wild Dallas (2-1). They then beat Waco in the semi-finals (3-0).

The Wild Fort Worth team was awarded the wildcard bid just one week before the tournament. They advanced to the championship rounds by defeating Waco (2-1), Houston (3-0) and Amarillo (3-0). Waco advanced to the semis as the lucky loser from round robin play.

Congratulations to both 8.0 teams from Fort Worth.

Fort Worth 4.0 Seniors win National Championship
Representing Texas, The Old Gang, captained by Bud Thames, won the 4.0 Senior National Championship on October 16-18 in Indian Wells, CA. After losing their first match 1-2 against New England, Texas won matches against Pacific NW and Southern to advance to the semi-finals over New England 6-5 in lines won. Texas then defeated the Middle States team 2-1 with two 3 set matches and finally Caribbean 3-0 again with two 3 set matches. The Old Gang: Bud Thames, Bill Stetzer, Mike Fincher, Frank Carpenter, Kent Harris, Jeff Moore and Stephen Osborne (not attending Nationals: Steve Campbell, Ford Roberson, Bruce Alford and Mark Henderson).

Fort Worth 9.0 Mixed Doubles
are Sectional Champions
in Corpus Christi October 2-4. The team, captained by Rafael Omana, defeated Houston in the final (3.0). The 9.0 team will head to Las Vegas on November 20-22 to compete in the National Championships.
The 8.0 team, captained by Hai Nguyen, lost in the finals to the Valley (2-1).

Fort Worth Wins Men's 4.0 Senior Sectionals
After sweeping their flight (San Antonio, Lubbock, Wild Dallas and Waco) winning 10 of 12 lines played, The Old Gang captained by Bud Thames advanced to play Corpus Christi in the semifinals where all three lines went to 11-9 third set tiebreaks with The Old Gang winning 2-1. They then won two lines against Dallas to advance to the National Championships in Indian Wells, CA on Oct. 16-18.

McLeland (Felipe Perez, captain) took second in the Senior 3.0 round robin. The TCU Mixon 3.5 team (John Mixon, captain) defeated Houston and SETX (both 2-1) but lost to Wild Dallas (0-3) to take second in the flight. The 4.5 men (Tom Avery, captain) lost close matches to NETX and Dallas.