Anderson ends men's squash career at national singles tournament

An unfortunate draw at the men's National Singles tournament held at Trinity College in Hartford, CT cut senior co-captain Nathan Anderson, the lone Jumbo representative, out of the tournament. While Anderson did not go into the weekend with the intention of winning, he had hoped that a better draw would give him more of a chance to advance further.

"He had a rough draw, he ended up having to play the number one seed," coach Doug Eng said. "There were a lot of other guys he could have beaten."

Given the team's finish in team nationals (third place in the Summers Division) last week, the squad was only able to send one person to the tournament. Had the team finished one spot higher, the squad may have been able to send two Jumbos, but instead Anderson was sent alone. The pool of 32 competitors was split into two divisions, and from their random draws was made to assign the match-ups.

Within his "B" Malloy Division, Anderson drew the number one seed, Ben Bernstein from Cornell. The style of play of the two athletes put Anderson at a slight disadvantage, given that Bernstein is a retriever while Anderson is a shooter.

"Nathan was putting pressure on, but made some errors. Ben hits very good drives and he's not an attacking player like Nathan, he just runs down everything," End said.

Bernstein swept Anderson 9-0 in the first set, but Anderson battled back to make a dent in the last two sets which ended at 9-3 and 9-4. Though the score tells the story of a game dictated by Bernstein, Anderson was able to make an impact in the final frames as he warmed to the manner of play.

"Ben has good drop and drives. Nathan played pretty well, he played well in the last two games against Ben," Eng said.

Heading into the consolation round, Anderson did not have much more luck as he squared off against Otto Schlosser of Franklin and Marshall. Franklin and Marshall is a strong team, with Schlosser ranking in the top three or four on the squad. The three matches ended with scores of 9-2, 9-0, 9-0.

As consolation for Anderson, his main draw opponent made it all the way to the semifinals, while his consolation competitor went to the quarterfinals. The fact that Anderson made it to this level of competitive squash is even more remarkable given the fact that he only started playing squash when he came to Tufts four years ago.

Anderson learned the mechanics of the sport his freshman year, and moved up the rankings on the team over the next three years. In his sophomore year Anderson played at seventh, while junior year he played four, and this year moved his way to second for the team.

"Every year there are only a few guys that can accomplish what he's done, given when he started playing," Eng said. "He was one of those guys this year. He got to the A level, and some of the guys there are just really good. It's a lot to ask for, I thought he did fine."

The fact that the regular season ended only a week before also played a factor in Anderson's performance at the National Singles contest. Anderson was not sure that he would be playing at the singles level, so he put the majority of his efforts into the team competition.

"He peaked at Nationals, had a very good win against Rochester," Eng said. "The team peaked at Nationals, and that has a lot to do with it. He and [senior co-captain] Chris Choi played the best match of their season on the last match at Nationals, that's quite a way to go out. I think Nathan was just squashed out."