Dave Leaderhouse
Special to the Herald
For the better part of two weeks the St. Mary High School boy’s doubles team of Greyson De Padua and Zayon Doctor looked unbeatable in Saskatchewan High School Athletic Association badminton playdowns, but in the end it was a silver finish when the provincial finals concluded on Saturday in Saskatoon.
“They played really well,” says coach Tyson Dallman. “They went in with a game plan and stuck to it.
In the semi-final they faced a little adversity, but in the end it was not quite enough to get it done.”
De Padua and Doctor breezed through the regional qualifying event in Humboldt at the beginning of the month winning all five matches to claim the region’s top seed going into provincials. They were so dominant at that event they did not drop a single game.
It looked like the trend was going to continue at the provincial tournament as the St. Mary duo got past Saskatoon’s Evan Hardy 21-16, 21-8; Moose Jaw Vanier 21-10, 21-8; and Regina Campbell 21-10, 21-11 to claim top spot in their pool following preliminary play.
De Padua and Doctor then faced Saskatoon Holy Cross in the semi-finals and for the first time they tasted defeat as they dropped the opening game 20-22. The pair bounced back, however, winning the next two games by identical 21-13 scores sending them to the gold-medal game against the powerful team from Regina Leboldus.
“They (Curtis brothers) are really experienced; they are very talented,” noted Dallman.
Leboldus cruised to the title beating De Padua and Doctor 21-11, 21-12 and in the process did not drop a single game all weekend.
“I’m very proud of our guys,” said Dallman. “The level of thought processing and execution is very high. There is a lot more to the game than just reacting.”
St. Mary was the lone local team to reach the podium as the team from Canwood was 1-2 in girl’s doubles as were the mixed doubles team from Carrot River and the Choiceland entry in girl’s singles. All three of those schools failed to advance from the preliminary round. There was no one from the surrounding area that moved on from regionals to compete in the boy’s singles event.
