GreenvilleOnline.com - Guzick continues family tradition

GreenvilleOnline.com - Guzick continues family tradition-- This newspaper story is about Will Guzick, the 16s Easter Bowl winner that I wrote about in this report (scroll to bottom of story) from the Easter Bowl last month.

But his sister Sarah is also a pretty fair tennis player, and soon her win at the Chanda Rubin Grade 5 ITF event in Baton Rouge last week will be old news. But it shouldn’t pass unnoticed. She’s 14, and was unseeded in Louisiana-- no surprise there as she hadn’t played an ITF tournament before-- but made her way past the third, fifth and eighth seeds (in that strange reversal of the expected progression through the draw) before beating another unseeded player Melanie Oudin, in the finals. Guzick also won the doubles. For some reason the ITF rankings are showing her with zero points, but she has earned 50, which would put her around 600 in the world.

Until the Easter Bowl, I had never heard of her, but that’s not because she hasn’t excelled. She was ranked number one in the country in the 14s last year, winning the Clays, and played the 16s in the Easter Bowl this year, losing a tough three-setter in the quarterfinals to finalist McCall Jones.

But most impressive was an off the court glimpse I got of her, tucked away in a corner booth in the banquet room/press headquarters at the Riveria, with a textbook in front of her, studying before a match. Not a common sight at a junior tennis tournament, and one I had to document with this photograph.

So congratulations to both the Guzicks, who appear to have the temperaments required for achievements both athletic and academic. It will be fun to watch them grow.