By James Zug
Photos by Steve Line/squashpics.com
The boy was shy. As a child, Mohamed Elshorbagy was aggressive on court. He went for outright nicks or it was a tin on every point. He played all-out at every practice. Every session was a pressure session. Even at a young age, he...
By James Zug
Squash has gone south. The McArthur Squash Center at the Boar’s Head Sports Club in Charlottesville, Virginia, opened in May 2013. The 33,000 square-foot building boasts a four-wall, white-ball glass showcourt with stadium seating for 50, bleachers for 250 and standing room for another 700. In addition,...
By James Zug
It was never supposed to work out like this. In the summer of 1981, Princeton’s athletic director asked Bob Callahan, newly-married IBM salesman, to be on a search committee to find a new coach for the Princeton University men’s squash team. He was a recent alum, former...
By James Zug
The 2013 Corporate Service Company Delaware Open was held at Vicmead Hunt Club in Wilmington, Delaware, in February. This $10,000 event, now in its fourth year, again featured a good mix of youth and veterans.
The former were very much present in the minds of the many spectators....
By James Zug
Ninety players from around the U.S. and Canada took part in the 27th annual National Junior Doubles in April 2013 in girl’s, boy’s and mixed age divisions. First run by Wilmington Country Club’s pro John Righter starting in 1986, the NJD has been the pet product of...
By James Zug
Thirty-five teams competed in the 2013 U.S. Father-Son Squash Championships in New York in April.
This was the ninth annual event and it was as robust as it was when it started in 2005, with a half dozen teams from that inaugural year on hand again eight years...
By James Zug
April 2013 was another extraordinary month in the extraordinary life of Victor Elmaleh. The ninety-four year-old Elmaleh (pronounced El-Mali) went to work each weekday as the chairman of his real estate development firm. He played squash. He and his wife Sono Osato celebrated their seventieth wedding anniversary...
By James Zug
For thirty years the Eric R. Finkelman Award has been the highlight of the Lapham-Grant weekend. The U.S. v. Canada matches date back to 1922 and thus are the oldest annual international matches in the game of squash. The weekend has always been known for off-court hijinks...
By James Zug
Back in 1907 young Fred Tompkins invented a game. He called it squash doubles. He used the fastest balls he could find and an unused space that happened to be 45 by 25 feet. He was a full-time squash, tennis and racquets pro at the Racquet Club...
By James Zug
It was a spectacular point and unlike most spectacular points, the entire tournament — and possibly much more — hinged on it.
In football you have The Drive and The Catch and The Play (possibly also The Fumble but there are two of them); in basketball you sort of...