In 2022-2023, a Task Force of the Board of the NWTO completed a 10-question survey of 16 of the 17 Sections of the USTA (all but the Caribbean). The newsletter will be publishing the results of the survey, one question at a time. Learn more about this initiative here.

QUESTION 4: How does the Section view the relationship of league play with age-based tournament play for women? Any thoughts on how this can be organized to the benefit of both league and tournament play?

Florida: Florida sees the need for leagues, NTRP, and age-based tournament play depending on the players personal needs and goals. The NTRP one or two-day tournaments were started to encourage women to participate in a tournament and have a decent draw. Most of these women are coming from league play and want a little more but at their level. This came about from tournament surveys and the lack of women participants compared to the men. No thoughts on how this can be organized to benefit all three.

Midwest: Basically, there is no interest in this section about age-level play.

Intermountain: There are many tournaments in the Section that include age-based brackets. Monica asked if it made sense for age-based brackets to follow the NTRP brackets, 18, 40, 55, and 65.

Eastern: The section has had committees that were charity-based. They stopped for the most part. The division sections hold awards and dinners. They are wonderful. The section does not promote National adult age-based tournaments. They encouraged ME to do it.

Southern California: This is an area of interest for SoCal and Anthony in particular - trying to bridge the interest from league to tournaments. There are many more women playing league tennis than tournaments in SoCal. Right now, tournaments conflict with league play. Anthony would like to try more Level 7 tournaments to bolster tournament play that would supplement league play. Make it a social event with a round robin type format as league players are used to the social aspect of play. How to promote it would be important - both for the players and clubs. The tournament would not be a big money maker for the club, but in the longer run could get more players playing tournaments or joining their clubs.

Texas: Texas has a program that reimburses the entry fee for League players who enter their first tournament (was sent to the League coordinators for distribution). Texas has the same challenges as the other sections. Tournament schedules and League schedules are independently performed. Realistically there isn't enough space on the calendar to accommodate playing opportunities in both formats without some conflict.

Southern: Southern is aware that league play is a year-round proposition. There are many conflicts that occur where players have to decide on which event to play. Most players go with their team event. Efforts have been made to try to coordinate calendars but with little to no success. League people really believe that NTRP players don’t play age group thus they see no reason to coordinate their calendars.

New England: They are at odds due to the USTA league calendar. We are thinking about and struggling with how to best cross-promote leagues and tournaments. Some people cannot spend an entire weekend away but could spend a couple of hours one day or night. Some people prefer weekends. Hard to find one common theme for everyone. Need variety.

Northern California: They are working to cross promote the two.

Southwest: Matt believes that the USTA nationally views NTRP ratings among players as more important than age-based rankings. He agrees that the NTRP rating system divides players, because playing solely in leagues for one rating means that players of the same ages do not get to know one another. He manages the adult tournaments in the Southwest Section and finds that the junior programs are more straightforward to organize. As we talked, he realized that one of the problems he was having was how many age brackets there are for adults versus juniors. Then, he realized that he could use the age brackets that are used in the Intersectionals for all of the age- based tournaments in the Section and that would make it easier to administer. After our talk, he was headed into Phoenix to help run the 65+ Women's Nationals league tournament.

Northern: In the past, tournaments were not at the forefront of what the adult department did, but in late in 2021 we went through staffing changes, and it is now becoming more of a focus to grow play opportunities. We think the relationship should be hand in hand with leagues and tournaments but that hasn’t been the case in the past, so we are working hard to change the direction.

Hawaii: In general, player interest is for league tennis and the section supports that interest. In 2022, their section had 2,300 league players and 7,000 registrations. So, league players are roughly playing in 3 different leagues annually. They support USTA league and Corporate league play. Effort toward NTRP events at 3 age levels is in its infant stages. They recently started using a NTRP championship to determine the qualifiers for the national NTRP tournament. They have 3 age divisions (18 and over, 40 and over and 55 and over) with NTRP of 3.0 - 4.5 for all ages; for 18 plus they also have 5.0 division.

MidAtlantic: Given the stop/start with covid, the tournament life does not look the same as pre- covid. League players usually play NTRP nationals or practice v national track. Actively tried to promote tournaments to league players. Feedback is that (they are) two different players. Little overlap when they looked at crossover data. Room for education.

Missouri Valley: The Adult Play committee includes the USTA Missouri Valley League Program Manager, Adult Tournament Program Manager, Committee Chair, Committee Vice-Chair, 4 Committee Members and a Board Liaison. League players are realizing that they can play tournaments. There are many weekend tournaments all the time from May to November, Levels 5- 7, some are for one day, some on Friday night only and are social.

After reading the above, do you have any recommendations or suggestions on how Adult Competition is best handled?  Please provide your feedback to Info @NWTO.us. We encourage you to reach out to your Section contacts with concerns or feedback:

Eastern – Lynn Buffamonti  buffamonti@eastern.usta.com
Florida – Christine Ducey  ducey@ustaflorida.com
Hawaii – Sara Yoshinaga  yoshinaga@hawaii.usta.com
Intermountain – Monica Haller-Bradley  mhaller@ita.usta.com
Mid-Atlantic – Rachel Kros  kros@mas.usta.com
Middle States – Mary Wurtz  Wurtz@ms.usta.com
Midwest – Toby Gaynor  toby@midwest.usta.com
Missouri Valley – Scott Howes  howes@movalley.usta.com
New England – Shawna Fors   shawna.fors@newengland.usta.com
Northern – Taylor Heltne  taylor@northern.usta.com
Northern California – Joanna Broda-Schnuk jbroda-schunck@norcal.usta.com
Pacific Northwest – Matthew Warren  mwarren@pnw.usta.com
Southern – Milagros Sequera Huss  sequera@sta.usta.com
Southern California – Anthony Shirley    ashirley@scta.usta.com
Southwest – Matt Gleason  gleason@southwest.usta.com
Texas – Veronica Nicholls  nicholls@texas.usta.com
Caribbean – Angela Vargas  adults@cta.usta.com

Learn more about this initiative here.

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