The First Semifinal – 2007 World Champs

September 15th, 2007 by Adam Katz

I remember at the Junior Worlds in Juarez, Mexico in 2005 that John Ellis played an exhibition match against Polo, but due to other issues I didn’t get a chance to see it.  I talked to John the next day and he mentioned that Polo was a very good player and that he had potential to do well if he would play the tour full time.

It looked like Polo’s speed caught Rocky off guard in the first game as he seemed to retrieve everything.  Rocky couldn’t find an answer and Polo, enjoying large crowd support slowly built his lead and finished things off 11-6.

The crowd was entertained by a local musician between games and then the second game started with the crowd wondering if Polo would continue his march through this draw.  Rocky, however, had other ideas and started trying everything in his arsenal, including, a few outdoor overhead serves.  They traded sideouts early, but Rocky kept the pressure on and pulled away for the 11-2 win.

In Game 3, both players came out intent on winning to gain the 2-1 edge and that showed in the many sideouts that started this one.  Finally at 4-4, Rocky was called for encroachment and unknowingly swung things in his own favor.  He started cutting everything Polo threw at him off in the front court for some relatively easy points and rolled to the 11-5 victory and the all important 2-1 games lead.

That seemed to take its toll on Polo as Rocky was now pumping his fist with every point and hitting everything just out of Polo’s reach.  Game 4 ended almost before it began as Rocky jumped to a 3-0 lead and just kept the pressure on throughout to score the 11-0 win and the match 3 games to 1.

Next up is the battle between Alvaro Beltran and Javier Moreno…let’s see if the higher seeds can continue to end the cinderella runs in these Motorola World Pro Racquetball Championships presented by Verizon Wireless.

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