With so many places to play tennis in and around Rye, weeknight league play is a staple for area athletes. American Yacht Club, Manursing Island Club, Apawamis Club, Westchester Country Club, and Larchmont Shore Club are all among the area tennis hotbeds that host competitive evening adult leagues.
Historically, USTA rules prohibited players over the age of 18 from competing on more than one team, which meant the top players frequently faced off, yet rarely played alongside members of an opposing club.
That changed this season when the USTA introduced experimental day leagues. For the first time, players were permitted to join whatever team they’d like during the day, without affecting their long-standing weeknight affiliations.
When Rye’s Clare Ansel and Alicia Glueckstein, captains of the Manursing Island Club ladies team, saw the news, they got to work assembling the area’s best of the best. The roster construction, with 17 of the team’s 21 members from Rye, paid off. On Aug. 10, the team qualified for USTA Nationals in its first season competing at the 3.5 level.
“When we got the USTA email saying they’d pilot a day league, Alicia and I both thought, ‘We’ve got the opportunity to put together a Rye super team that could go all the way,’” Ansel said.
The team, fittingly called Rye’d or Die, accumulated 157.5 points in the day league, well ahead of the runner-up’s 106 points. In regionals, Rye’d or Die went 2-0 against the evening league champions and the winners of the Mid-Hudson League, winning nine of their 10 individual matches. Finally, the team won five straight matches from Aug. 8-10 to qualify for nationals this October in Surprise, Ariz. It will be the first nationals appearance for all but one member of the team.
“Last year, we made it to sectionals as a 3.0 team,” Glueckstein said. “Ninety-eight percent of our team got bumped up to a whole new level at 3.5, and within a few months in our rookie season, we’re going to nationals. It’s amazing. Last year, we came within one Sunday tiebreaker of making it, so we were so close. We had chips on our shoulders.”
Other team members from Rye include Laura Furnary, Jennifer Soliman, Sarah Fraser, Kati Vogiatjis, Katie Nicholson, Christie Louis, Leah Viault, Virginia Cocke, Valerie Chuebon, Lia Pepper, Kimberly Heavey, Philippa Hartman, Christine Groves, Susan Kloepfer, and Katie Watson. Non-Rye residents include Hadley Gerrish (Greenwich), Mallory Hutchinson (Harrison), Kyle Healy (Stamford), and Danielle Weiss (New City).
“We were based out of Manursing Island Club, but we were successful because we brought together super talented ladies who play elsewhere in town,” Glueckstein said. “The sheer number of courts we needed — five in the middle of the day — is no small feat. The director at Manursing heard our plea, and the pros there taught us. The support that made it possible was a Manursing effort, and the players who came together made it a Rye effort.”
Thanks to their on-court success, and their clever nickname, Rye’d or Die is quickly becoming a trendy team to support throughout the community.
“We created a lot of team swag around our name,” Glueckstein said. “A lot of husbands went nuts and ordered it.”
“You’ll probably start seeing Rye’d or Die tucker hats around town,” Ansel added.
