Imagine hearing shouts coming from Kelsey’s, throw in some friendly ribbing and a huge helping of teasing and trash talking, and you’d come up with many possibilities of who might be involved until you realize it’s the members of the Orillia Tennis club at one of their hilarious social nights.
In fact, this one is special – it's a draft night for the Davis Cup. Teams are selected based on their tennis rating level by tournament chair and club president Kevin Smith.
Over dinner and drinks, teams are drafted live in front of the players. Members slowly shift and gather as teams are formed to cheer and jeer.
“It’s fun to see the looks on people’s faces as they hear their names called out and assigned to a specific team,” said Ken Brownlee.
While the social side of the club is always great, the tennis is the thing!
The Davis Cup sees four teams of eight players engage in round-robin competition. The trick for team captains is to assign a different combination of players to play against similarly rated players without knowing who is assigned to each court from the other team.
Once the big reveal occurs, the tennis begins. Each participant is guaranteed nine matches over the course of the day. Each match generates points for the team.
“The excitement over which team leads after each round is always an indication of how much fun the competitors are having this year," Smith remarked.
Once the tennis is done for the day, participants return to our sponsor, Kelsey’s, for the announcement of the winning team. The team with the highest point total wins the coveted Davis Cup.
Your Orillia Tennis Club knows how to have fun, and the sounds from the post-event weren’t very different from the sraft night – lots of speculation as to who was going to win.
In the end, tournament director and club president Kevin Smith announced the Spinners, captained by three-time Davis Cup Captain Jeff Booth, as the winning team. Team members are Linda Alm, Jennifer Langlois, Margie McParland, Paul Wallis, Booth, Sal Shivakumar, Kate Switzer and Jeff Switzer.
Members of the team have their name engraved on the Cup and the Cup is displayed in the Rotary Place trophy case.
This annual event is a great way to not only meet and socialize with members of the club, but also to be involved in some local competition. Clearly this event that features 32 members of the club in a single day event is one the OTC will bring back each year.
