Action heats up at Labor Day tennis tournament

The Leavenworth Open Labor Day Tennis Tournament graced the courts of Leavenworth for the 38th consecutive year this weekend, and the action at Brewer Park, Leavenworth High School, and Cody Park yet again provided its share of excitement.

Quite possibly the story of the weekend happened in the men’s open singles division, where unseeded Chris Benson provided a blast from the past and beat opponents he’d never beaten before en route to the title.

Benson, who 20 years ago won the boys’ 18-and-under singles title, pulled two straight upsets in the final two rounds this weekend and did so in thrilling fashion. He knocked off the No. 2 seed and defending champion Jesse Sherer in a third-set super tiebreaker before doing the same in the championship against top-seeded Jim Stoner. Benson lost the first set to Stoner 6-7 but won the second set 7-6 before taking the super tiebreaker 10-6.

Sherer and Stoner each got another shot at a championship in the open doubles division, which provided another super tiebreaker. It was Sherer who teamed with Alan Crute to come back and win it, beating Stoner and Mike Clemons 5-7, 6-2, 10-4.

On the women’s side Katherine Bassett — an assistant basketball coach at Sterling College — stole the show by winning both the open singles and doubles championships. She beat Megan Warner 6-0, 6-0 in the championship of the open singles, and she teamed with sister Anne Bassett — who won the open singles championship in 1995 — to win the round-robin open doubles title. Rachel Elkins and Linda Long of Lansing placed second in that division, and the mother-daughter combo of Michelle and Amy Briggs, also of Lansing, took third.

One of the most competitive divisions was men’s 55-and-over singles, which featured 10 entries. Leavenworth’s George Morton had won the title nine straight years, the longest such run in any division in the tournament’s history, but his streak was ended 6-3, 7-5 in the quarterfinals by Jarmir Born, a native of the Czech Republic who just turned 55. That also ended a 27-match winning streak by Morton in the division, but Born was knocked out in the semis by Roger Herting 5-7, 6-2, 10-6. The other semi in the division also featured a super tiebreaker, with Bill Herster beating Leavenworth’s Kirby Brown 4-6, 7-6, 10-7, but Herster was beaten 6-4, 6-2 in the championship by Herting.

The super tiebreakers didn’t stop there on the men’s side, as Junping Yang won the 35-and-over singles division 6-1, 4-6, 10-6 over defending champion Stephen Mathis. At 50-and-over doubles, Morton and Brown survived a semifinal over Steve Pigg and Bob Keeshan 3-6, 6-2, 10-8, but they fell in the championship 6-0, 6-1 to defending champions Mark Small and Scott Enge.

Two other doubles divisions with large draws were hosted this weekend. The newly formed team of Crute and Fort Leavenworth’s Mary Campen won four matches to win the open mixed doubles. They barely beat Lansing’s Ed Fenton and Amy Briggs 7-5, 4-6, 10-8 in the semifinals before beating Lansing’s Ezra Carpenter and Anisha Patel 6-1, 6-1 for the title. Carpenter and Patel had beaten the married team of Steve and Joanna Mathis 6-2, 6-4 in the semis.

In the parent-child doubles’ division, which featured 12 teams, Mark and Andrew Ellis defending their title by beating Jim and Geoff Branine 6-4, 6-2. The Branines had beaten Garrett and Mark Small 7-5, 6-1 in the semis, while the Ellises had beaten Mark and Abraham Poulose 6-3, 6-4.

Four youth divisions were also hosted. Garrett Small won the championship in boys’ 18-and-under singles, beating Leavenworth’s Brent Gersema 6-3, 6-1. In the round-robin girls’ 18-and-under singles, Patel took first, Olivia Wilson was second, and Theresa Hernandez was third. In boys’ 14-and-under singles, round-robin results saw Isaac Mathis take first, Mark Hernandez second, Nic Hurt third, and Parker Billings fourth. And, with the first ever girls’ 12-and-under singles round robin, Jillian Mathis was first, Sierra Brown was second, Stacey Briggs was third, and Molly Tanke was fourth.