Out & About: St. Paul Championships Day 2

#2 posting 5.10.2007
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ST. PAUL CHAMPIONSHIPS DAY 2

Harding swept the top honors today with Pang Thao taking the singles title and the duo of Dia Xiong/PaNhia Yang taking the doubles title.

SINGLES
SEMIFINALS
In the semifinals #1 Pang Thao faced her own teammate Harding's #2 Mee Xiong who was seeded #4. Thao won 21-15, 21-6.

The first game was more of a battle with Thao taking an early 4-1 lead. Mee Xiong took a 10-7 lead on her fifth serve with four staight service points. All the points, including the previous side out were all on Thao hitting errors. Thao captured the lead on her 7th serve with four straight service points 15-11. A missed serve gave the bird back to Xiong. Both players traded side outs. Xiong broke the pattern as Thao had a net error to tighten the game to 16-14. Thao ended that with a smash. She finished up with a 5-1 run to win 21-15.

Game two ended up 21-6, but the game featured longer rallies that game one. Too give you an indication it was an average of 10.89 seconds per point in game one, 12.67 in game two. Another big difference in this game was the side out %. Thao checked in with 80% to 16.7% for Xiong. Thao had runs of five and six to push the game out to 18-4. Xiong added two points before the close.

Oddly enough both games were off by one each time for Xiong in the official book.

SIDEOUTS:
Thao 10/14 .714; Xiong 6/16 .375
SERVE RUNS:
Thao 4 (longest 6); Xiong 1 (4)
POINTS:
Thao 42. Winners 28: Drives 14 (soft 8); Smashes 7; Clears 4; Drops 3
Xiong Errors 14: hitting 14 (Net 12, Wide 2)
Xiong 21: Winners 4: Drives 3, Smashes 1
Thao Errors 17: hitting 14 (Wide 7, Net 7); Serving 3: (wide 2, net 1)
TIME: 12:14; Average Rally: 11.65 seconds.

In the other semi it was Khoua Xiong of Highland Park edged Lee Vue of Central in three. In the third game Xiong led at all breaks after taking a 3-2 lead. Xiong went up 19-14 on her 10th serve. Vue stormed back with four straight (including the side out) to tie the game. Xiong broke the tie on a drive for the side out. Xiong finished with a drive for the win.

FINALS
Thao won both games 21-7 and 21-7 (or 18-7) for the championship. Thao led from start to finish. She opened game one with a 4-0 lead. She scored on all her serves but her third. Thao's sideout game was strong too at 6/7. This was over in 4:33 meaning the average rally was 9.75 seconds.

Game two ended a lot more quickly because the scoring again was off---this time for Thao by three. I had 18-7 when the game ended. I think the problem came when Xiong had to stop to tie her shoe. After action resumed the score had inflated. Even with the shoe incident the average rally was 10.36,
Highland's Khoua Xiong is the loudest singles player around. On every play that goes for point for the opponent it is "good ups!"

SIDEOUTS:
Thao 11/13 .846; Xiong 4/14 .286
SERVE RUNS:
Thao 6 (longest 5); Xiong 0
POINTS:
Thao 39* (my charting). Winners 28: Drives 10 (6 soft); Aces 6 (short 4, deep 2); Drops 6; Clears 3; Smashes 3
Xiong Errors 11: hitting 11 (Net 9, Wide 2)
Xiong 14: Winners 9: Drops 6, Drives 2, Clears 1
Thao Errors 5: hitting 3 (Wide 2, net 1); Serving 2: (wide 1, net 1)
TIME: 8:52; Average Rally: 10.04 seconds.

DOUBLES
Since both championships were going on simultaneously I didn't get to see all of the action between the Harding pair of Dia Xiong/PaNhia Yang vs. the Johnson duo of Karen Obermeyer-Kolb/Kia Thao. Johnson took the first game 22-20. Harding's pair had to win twice and they got a tight 21-19 win in game two. Xiong and Yang finished game three with a 21-14 win.

Next up: tomorrow.