Jennifer Saunders fell one win short in her quest for a seventh-straight women’s national racquetball title in Burnaby May 23, falling 7-15, 7-15 to Frédérique Lambert of Montreal in the final.
Earlier in the week, the Thompson-raised Saunders, who now lives in Winnipeg, made Canadian racquetball history when she won the women’s doubles title with her partner Danielle Drury of Saskatoon. That was Saunders’s 11th national women’s doubles title and, combined with her eight singles championships, gave her a record-tying 19th career women’s racquetball title. It was the first time she won a title with Drury.
Saunders qualified for the singles title match by beating Valerie Fallu of Brossard, Que. in the semifinals after opening the tournament with a win over Brigitte Richard of Sainte-Basile-le-Grand, Que.
Drury and Saunders, who was named to Thompson’s sports Wall of Fame in March, went 4-0 in the five-team women’s doubles round robin to claim the national championship.
Results from the singles and doubles open divisions at the 2015 Racquetball Canadian Championships will be used to help determine the final selections for the team that will represent Canada in racquetball at the 2015 Pan Am Games in Toronto this summer. The team announcement from the Canadian Olympic Committee is expected to take place June 5.
Saunders went into last year’s national racquetball championships in Brossard as the second seed but emerged as the undisputed number one in career women’s national championships, capturing her eighth – the last six of them consecutively – to take the record away from Heather Stupp, with whom she had previously been tied with seven.
She and her previous doubles partner Josée Grand’Maître of Longueuil, Que., with whom Saunders won the 2014 national doubles championship, are tied with 19 combined national women’s singles and doubles racquetball championships.
