Her two older sisters also played tennis, and people like former Shaker High School standouts Kristen Odabashian and Amanda O’Hearn built the resumes Crummey wanted. And she did.
“Odabashian and O’Hearn were names I had heard of long before I really knew what they looked like,” Crummey said. He won his third straight Section 2 girls tennis singles title in 2011. 1991-93, and O’Hearn matched a decade later. “Doing what they did was something I dreamed of doing and I wanted to be on that list. I never got the chance to play with them, but I helped keep that dynasty going.”
Shaker, coached by Gerard Cuva over the past 20 years, has 12 Section 2 team titles, but other schools such as Saratoga Springs, Bethlehem, Niskayuna, Shenendehowa and Guilderland also have very impressive programs. What these schools can’t match, or even come close to, is Shaker’s list of individual champions. The girls wearing Shaker High blue have won 17 singles titles, nine of which are from Odabashian, O’Hearn and Crummey. A total of eight girls have won Blue Bison championships, including Cary Oberting, who started 1983 by winning the first of her two titles.
Along with some great players, Shaker was also blessed with coaches by his side. Cuva, Wayne Emerich and Tim O’Brien have kept the program at or near the top of Section 2 for more than 30 years. And success begets success.
Emerich served as team president from 1991 to 2002, but also ran a junior tennis camp in the school district with former Shaker High School boy Chuck Poe. Crummey joined the program and was able to take her game to a very high level through the guidance of Emerich and former Edison Club pro Sonny Mayer.
“I think I was four or five years old when I got my first lesson from Wayne,” Crummey said. Sonny and his daughters have been instrumental in my success.” “I wrote an essay about how much of an inspiration Sonny’s daughter, Sarah, was to me when I was in middle school. Wayne, who was my coach at Shaker when I was a little girl, was great, Sonny really helped me and Gerry was great too. When I was very young, Wayne and Sonny always had me banging with older girls, and I think that’s what kept me going. “I’m short and short, but I was introduced to high-level tennis at a really young age.”
Inspired by her coaches and other former Shaker champions, Crummey also had the fortune of being the younger sister of Conna and Carol Crummey.
“I was young, but they were playing tennis. “That’s why I wanted to play tennis and why I worked so hard,” she said. “At that time, when I joined the varsity team in 7th grade, my older sister Kona was a senior and captain of the team. How lucky I am to have such a great role model. And how special it was that my older sister was captain of the team in 7th grade.”
After high school, Crummey went to the University at Albany on a tennis scholarship, but played there for only two years before transferring to SUNY Geneseo, where she set the school’s record for most wins during her senior year. Single. She earned a Master of Business Administration from Springfield College and served as an assistant women’s tennis coach before moving on to Albany Law School. She currently serves as an attorney at Greenberg Traurig in Albany, where she specializes in government law and policy.
Crummey still plays tennis today and was a key member of the Region 5.0 team that advanced to the USTA Nationals last fall.
“Obviously I don’t play as much as I used to,” she said. “But I still enjoy it and it was a lot of fun playing at nationals. That feeling comes back when I step on the court. “I still love the game.”
multiple winners
Crummey, Ohearn and Odabashian all won three singles titles for the Blue Bison, but they weren’t the school’s only multiple winners. As previously mentioned, Oberting won twice in the 1980s, and those who each won two singles titles for Shaker were Sarah Mayer (2003-04) and Jasleen Sandhu (2006-07). Shannon Mukerji (2012) and Lee Hae-jin (2016) also won Blue Bison singles titles.
Cuva says there are many reasons why Shaker has produced so many champions.
“It’s a combination of several things, the first being that the district has always viewed tennis as an important sport,” he said. “Sometimes I go to a game and I see the school assistant principal, the high school principal and the athletic director there. Tennis is a major sport and treated as such.”
Cuva also said various local tennis pros such as Emerich, Sonny Mayer and former world-class player Amy Tarkleson before becoming the school’s coach have all had a huge impact on the program. Taklson, who sadly passed away in 2016 at the age of 53, was Odavasian’s personal coach during his run at Shaker.
“A lot of the girls worked with Sonny and loved hitting with his daughters, and other local pros like Amy Tarkleson also stepped into the role,” Cuva said. “Wayne and I have been here for a while and that’s important. Our players and their parents are dedicated and we have a large feeder program with summer program enrollment reaching 400.”
As for team competition this season, Cuva said there are several standout teams, including defending Section 2 champion Bethlehem. Saratoga Springs is also near the summit, and Shenendehowa and Guilderland are countless. He expects the Blue Bison team and Niskayuna to join him as well, but isn’t making any predictions. Shaker won the Suburban Council championship and tournament in 2020, but there were no section events due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Niskayuna sophomore Olivia Dartawan is the defending Section 2 singles champion and performed very well at the state event in Central Park last fall, advancing to the championship match.
Dartawan appears destined to become multiple Section 2 champions, and despite being an underclassman, it hasn’t stopped numerous girls from winning. Ten other people have won two or more titles:
Hudson’s Megan Yates won five sectional singles titles from 1994-98. Four-time winners were Saratoga’s Jenny Whalen (1985-88) and Schenectady/Mohonasen’s Loren Cuomo (2017-19 and 2021).
ZACHARCZENKO wins gold medal
Ballston Lake’s Nick Zacharczenko has had a busy 2024 as he travels throughout the eastern United States and competes against some of the nation’s best players in the 65-and-older age group. And while the game of pickleball is much more popular as a doubles event, Zacharczneko only plays singles.
Zacharczenko reached the quarterfinals at the U.S. Open in Naples, Fla., last April with a level 4.5, and won the Connecticut Masters in Rocky Hill in June, also with a level 4.5.
In July, he beat the field at the Pennsylvania Senior Games at the advanced level, and in September he added another title to his resume, winning the New Jersey Senior Olympics, also at the advanced level.
2024-10-03 02:03:29