This year’s Urban Team Nationals was Steel City Squash’s best yet! Our boys and girls were both seeded 4th in their draws, but showed up to UTN very confident. The girls started the weekend with a strong win, but lost their second match to the eventual champions in a close 2-3 battle. The deciding match went to 10-12 in the fifth game. No other team came that close to beating the #1 seed from the Bronx. They regrouped and won convincingly in the 3/4 playoff, beating their seed and finishing 3rd in the Girls Middle School B Division.

The boys pulled off upset after upset, making it all the way to the championship. The match was tied 2-2 going into our final matchup in the #3 spot. Namell went down 1-2 in games but fought back to even the game score at 2 all. In the fifth, his opponent got out to a solid lead and had 3 championship balls at 7-10. Namell calmed himself down, fought back, and won 5 points in a row to clinch the Middle School Boys B Division championship!

Our 12 Steel City Squashers represented themselves and our program so well both competitively and in their sportsmanship and kindness. They were also the only team who actively gathered themselves together for homework time in between matches. This is our best UTN result to date and we are so proud of all the hard work and dedication our students have put in to get themselves to this point.