The Northern New Mexico National Junior Tennis and Learning (NJTL) season finished strong at the Jerry Cline Tennis Center on Saturday, July 23rd. Six teams representing three NJTL programs were present from the Santa Fe First Serve NJTL, Albuquerque NJTL, and Belen NJTL. Other programs in Northern New Mexico were not able to attend including the Los Alamos NJTL, Rio Rancho NJTL, and Santa Fe NJTL.
Team coaches met at 8am to review the rally rules of the day. We passed out t-shirts and participation prizes. Round robin match play started at 9am.
Check out our facebook page to see rally action shots from the day. Click here.
Lunch was prepared by Fred Hultberg at noon for the players. Burgers, hot dogs, chips and fruit were enjoyed by everyone. An Arthur Ashe video played for the lunch break in the Jerry Cline Conference Room. Thank you Fred for a great lunch.
At the end of the day, the Albuquerque 1 team squeaked out the win over the Belen 1 team. It was exciting tennis. The award ceremony immediately started after the last match was done the results tallied. Congratulations to ABQ1 players: Dalton, Ryan, Sahlil, Andre, Jerry, Jhaydah, Sophia, Yvonne, Sofia, Ella and Lucia! Congratulations to these players for their great team accomplishment!
Sportsmanship Awards were also given out. These players exemplified the characters we recognize iin Arthur Ashe, a founder of NJTL. These players were graceful in winning and losing and truly had fun playing the game. The recipients this year of our sportsmanship awards were: ABQ1 Dalton and Sophia; ABQ2 Addison and Aidan; Belen1 Enzo and Monica; Belen2 Degan and Delicia; SF1 Marella and Mason; and SF2 Jose and Chloe. Thank you players for your wonderful character and great sportsmanship!
Special thank you to our three program directors. Cristin Chavez-Smith from Albuquerque NJTL, was our host for the day. Cristin provided courts and photography. Albuquerque teams were managed by the Albuquerque summer staff. Lindsey, Kelly, Cesar, and Nicole did a great job with the kids.
Nancy Keeran from Sante Fe First Serve brought our Santa Fe players. She was most thoughtful when she spontaneously brought out four watemelons for all the kids. Her teams were managed by the SF First Serve graduates from the program: Jacob, Rafael, Samantha, Jorge, Sonam, and Isaiah.
And finally Barbara Grega managed our Belen teams. Barbara is our veteran NJTL leader. She has participated in the NJTL program for many years. She has a wonderful program that reaches deep into her Belen community. She brought with her coaches Chrissy and Patrick.
