With the foot firmly on the gas pedal, the “Butter Nutz” raced to the top of the standings this week picking up a league best 34 points, and now has opened up a healthy 13 point lead over second placed “Mongoose”. Last week’s league leaders “Winky-Dinks” sat out this round and even though they still managed to gather 9 points in makeup matches dropped to 4th place on the ladder. And steadily chugging along is “Mercedes”. Out of all the teams that have so far suffered through the bye week, they are ranked above all of them – a great position to be in.
Once again, however, the last two ranked teams are struggling to make any headway. “Destiny” scored only 12 points since last week, and “WallEED” 13. Even worse, was “Vivio’s” who picked up a measly 6 – that’s 3 less than the team that had the bye! – and consequently they dropped from 5th to 7th and in severe danger of occupying the basement if that trend continues.
There was a lot of play last night, but a high percentage of it was pick-up squash. Courts were full, beer was flowing, and the handballers were out in force with their tournament. For the record, court usage for this month is the highest since we started counting – since the year 2000. Now, if only everybody was also playing their league matches, I couldn’t imagine how full the courts would be.
There were a few tough matches completed yesterday: Brian Bartes (“Vivio’s”) survived for a 2-1 win over Chip McDaniel (“Foss-ters”) who I thought was about to keel over after the match as he staggered off the court and immediately hit the floor. Not to worry, however, it wasn’t long until beer had saved the day… Bruce VandeVusse (“Mongoose”) was able to fend off the hard hitting Joe Bobzin (“Destiny”) 2-1; and Anil Kathuria (“Wardogs”) took his 6th win on a row over Chuck Doyle (“Butter Nutz”) 2-1.
Next week we see match-ups between the top 4 teams: “Winky-Dinks” v “Butter Nutz” and “Mercedes” v “Mongoose”. The way these squads have been turning up (they are also the top 4 teams earning bonus points) there is a very good chance they could put a lot of distance between themselves and the rest. Adding the fact that the 5th placed team “Wardogs” has the bye, the bottom four teams should really be feeling the pressure. Remember, the last three teams will be eliminated for the play-offs.