I’ve written about a lot of sports in this space but I’m not sure that I have ever written anything about tennis. I realize tennis does not carry a large following of fans or players in Adams County, I’m not even sure there are any tennis courts anywhere to be found. I’ve always kind of been a tennis fan and I guess now I am even more of one thanks to the Western & Southern Open, the ATP/USTA event that is held every August in Mason.

We made a trip last Friday night to the Lindner Family Tennis Center to catch a pair of quarterfinal matches, one women’s and one men’s (more about them later). I was also there to catch a few minutes with my daughter Kelsey, who if I may be allowed to brag is the Senior Manager, Partnerships for the tournament. She works her tail off all year for this one week and it is good to see the fruits of her efforts all over the grounds. I have another connection with the W & S Open through family. The original founder of the tournament, the late Paul Flory, is from Higginsport and a graduate of Higginsport High School, just like all of my Mom’s side of the family and they were buddies with Mr. Flory.

In fact, my first exposure to the W & S Open came through Mr. Flory. Many years ago, I was in attendance at a Ripley Alumni Dinner and my mother introduced me to Mr. Flory. In the course of our conversation, he asked if I enjoyed or played tennis and I answered yes to both and he asked for my address and a few days later an envelope arrived in my mailbox with two tickets to the tournament, Mr. Flory’s seats no less. A friend of mine and I went and as I recall the biggest name we saw in action was Mats Wilander. As you enter the Tennis Center now, there is a well-deserved statue to honor Paul Flory at the entrance.

I mentioned that I played tennis. In my younger days, I played a lot, nearly every night playing doubles with three friends of mine on what were then the new tennis courts in Ripley, which are now barely used and in disrepair unfortunately. We played enough to be pretty decent and though I didn’t have big power serve the fact that I had long legs and long arms allowed me to get to a lot of balls that my buddies couldn’t I was all set with my Andre Agassi racket and my Agassi shoes, I was cool out there, almost as cool as Agassi himself.

I even played in a tennis tournament once, as part of the now defunct Ohio Tobacco Festival. It was mixed doubles and you’ll never guess who my partner was. My partner was Andrew Benintendi’s grandmother Doris and my memory tells me that we finished second overall.

Tennis is a lot like soccer these days, a very international sport. An estimated 200,000 fans attended the W & S Open last week from 30 different countries. Let me assure you that a tennis crowd is a whole different culture actually, and a bit refreshing to be honest. The required quiet, only being allowed to move from your seats at specific times, it’s kind of cool actually, though I did get elbowed a couple of times by my partner for allegedly talking too loud.

On Friday night, in the two matches we saw, there was only one American playing. One American woman, one French woman, one British man, and one male Spaniard. Both matches were great, especially the men’s, where two fellows named Cameron Norrie and Carlos Alcaraz slugged it out for over three hours. My eyesight doesn’t allow me to clearly make out the player’s faces, but I was able to follow the ball and it was moving at time at over 20 miles an hour. The girl that won the match we watched was just a qualifier and she ended up winning the entire thing. Cool tennis story- Caroline Garcia from France. yeah, I know, it didn’t sound French to me either.

I wish I had the ability to hit the tennis courts still today, but I may just have to resort to Nathan Copas teaching me to play pickleball. One thing I’d wish for this winter at some basketball games though. When the crowd got rowdy and berating the officials, I’d like to be able to say “Quiet please” and they all shut up. Tennis anyone?

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