Jury Is Still Out on Scoring System

Is change the name of the game?

Intercollegiate Tennis Assn. coaches, players and officials are trying to figure that out with a change in scoring instituted in tournaments this season.

The change from regular scoring of games is an experiment intended for use through December, when ITA officials will make a decision about whether to adopt it.

In the new system, players still have to win four points to take a game. However, a maximum of nine points is allowed in a game, and one deuce and one advantage instead of the unlimited numbers dictated by players in regular scoring.

If games go to 3-3, players must take the next two points to win. If a game goes to 4-4, there is a single point to decide the winner.

The change can be equated to rally-scoring in volleyball--in which sideouts are eliminated--and is intended to shorten matches, simplify scoring and add excitement.

“The feeling is, there might be some ways to make the game better, and you’re never going to know unless you experiment with it,” said David Benjamin, ITA executive director.

The idea of changing scoring was floated around college tennis two years ago.

Proposed by longtime Harvard men’s Coach Dave Fish, the new system was approved for experimental use 10 months ago by the ITA’s 35-member operating committee. If considered successful, the system probably will be implemented in college matches beginning next fall.

“So far, we’re not getting a lot of opposition to it, and we’re not getting overwhelming support for it either,” Benjamin said. “I’m kind of reserving judgment on it myself.”

Freshmen made their marks in their first college national tennis tournaments last weekend in the Riviera Women’s All-American Championships at Pacific Palisades.

UCLA’s Megan Bradley, the highest-rated freshman in the nation in the ITA preseason rankings at No. 46, defeated California’s Raquel Kops-Jones in the first round and had top-seeded and top-ranked Bea Bielik on the ropes before Bielik won, 4-6, 7-6 (1), 7-6 (4), in the second round.

USC freshman Luana Magnani, a former Southern Section champion from San Marino High, made it through prequalifying and qualifying rounds in singles and doubles to get into the main draw in both.

Her run came to an end in the first round of main-draw singles when she retired with a leg injury during a match with Duke’s Kelly McCain with McCain leading, 6-2, 3-2. Magnani and teammate Anita Loyola had to pull out of their first-round doubles match because of the injury.

McCain, another freshman, reached the semifinals before losing to fourth-seeded Nataly Cahana.

The unseeded team of Marcin Matkowski and Jean-Julien Rojer defeated Stanford’s Scott Lipsky and David Martin, 8-5, to win the doubles title Sunday in the ITA Men’s All-American Championships at Atlanta.

Matkowski and Rojer are the third UCLA team to win the All-American title.

Justin Gimelstob and Srdjan Muskatirovic won in 1995 and Pat Galbraith and Brian Garrow won in 1988.