{"id":277276,"date":"2018-06-01T06:06:46","date_gmt":"2018-05-31T20:06:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/?p=277276"},"modified":"2018-06-01T06:06:46","modified_gmt":"2018-05-31T20:06:46","slug":"cnmi-sweeps-opener-in-fiji","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/cnmi-sweeps-opener-in-fiji\/","title":{"rendered":"CNMI sweeps opener in Fiji"},"content":{"rendered":"
Ken Song makes a strong return to Robbie Schorr during a local tournament this season at the Fiesta Resort & Spa Saipan courts. Both players are in Fiji and won their opening games in the Inaugural Nations Cup Pacific. (Contributed Photo)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The CNMI Tennis Team stood out in the opening day of the Inaugural Nations Cup Pacific after beating Fiji and Oceania 2 yesterday in Fiji.<\/p>\n

The Commonwealth\u2019s men\u2019s crew made up of Robbie Schorr, Ken Song, and Ji Min Woo swept the Fiji Development Men\u2019s Team, 3-0, while the Carol Lee-led CNMI women\u2019s squad outclassed Oceania Women\u2019s Combined 2, 2-1.<\/p>\n

Song handed the CNMI its first win when he dominated Saurav Sharma in the second singles match, 6-1, 6-2. Schorr, on the other hand, played in the first singles tiff against Sebastian Tikaram and labored through a 7-5 victory in the first set before easing his way to a win in the second, 6-0, to seal the pool play triumph for the Commonwealth.<\/p>\n

Song returned to Court 3 to team up with Woo and they also needed only two sets to down Sharma and Tikaram, 6-4, 6-2, and complete the sweep.<\/p>\n

The CNMI is in Group C of the men\u2019s team competition, which also has Tahiti and Oceania Combined 1. Schorr and company will face Oceania Combined 1 today. The Top 2 teams after the pool play will advance to the playoffs.<\/p>\n

Other squads entered in the men\u2019s field are Group A\u2019s Solomon Islands, American Samoa, and Fiji, Group B\u2019s Vanuatu, Samoa, and Tonga, and Group D\u2019s Kiribati, Tuvalu, the Cook Islands, and the Federated States of Micronesia.<\/p>\n

In the women\u2019s division, the CNMI is in Group B and got its first win from Lee, who whipped Papua New Guinea\u2019s Patricia Apisah, 6-0, 6-1. In the other singles game, Tuvalu\u2019s Alesi Molotii downed the CNMI\u2019s Isabel Heras, 6-2, 6-2, to help Oceania 2 stay in contention. Heras then redeemed herself in doubles play and handed the Commonwealth the win when she and Lee slipped past Apisah and Molotii in an extended game, 6-3, 5-7, 11-9.<\/p>\n

Next up for Heras, Lee, and Conatsu Kaga are American Samoa. They will then be pitted against Tonga tomorrow for their last pool play.<\/p>\n

There are only three groups in the women\u2019s team event with Vanuatu, Samoa, and Fiji entered in Group A and Cook Islands, Solomon Islands, FSM, and Oceania 1 in Group B.<\/p>\n

In other results in the women\u2019s division, Vanuatu beat Fiji, 2-1; Cook Islands defeated the Solomon Islands, 2-1; and Oceania 1 shut down FSM, 3-0. American Samoa and Tonga were in a deadlock, 1-1, and results of the deciding doubles game were unavailable at press time.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The CNMI Tennis Team stood out in the opening day of the Inaugural Nations Cup…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":29,"featured_media":277279,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[167,26,21406,466],"class_list":["post-277276","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sports","tag-american-samoa","tag-cnmi","tag-fiji-development-men","tag-tonga"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/277276","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/29"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=277276"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/277276\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/277279"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=277276"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=277276"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=277276"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}