When I — a former tennis player — walk onto a squash court, I often think, "Hey, it's so much harder to hit the ball out of this little box than it is out of a tennis court, so I'm just going to beat the hell out of the ball every time."
Therein lies the failure of so many beginner squash players.
But there is hope for all of us recreational and social squash players. In this edition of The Daily Princetonian Sports 101, we will examine the different shots of squash.
If you are truly a beginner, and you are playing with other beginners, resist the urge to whack away. Instead, try to play the ball high, deep and to the corners.
"I find that for social players, balls that rebound off the back wall or the back corners will be hard to return," sophomore Kimlee Wong said.
Wong is currently No. 2 on Princeton's varsity ladder and overwhelmed his opponent, 9-3, 9-1 and 9-4, in the Tigers' season-opening rout of Cornell.
"If you're playing a social player, just play it deep," Wong said.
Once you've gotten comfortable on the court, and you aren't just walloping the ball, a good, reliable shot is the "rail shot." Rail shots ought to be deep, like Wong recommended, but the best rail shots run very close, or "tight," along the side wall. Shots are described as "loose" if they float away from the side wall toward the middle of the court.
Ideal rail shots are both deep and tight and usually find their way to the back corners of the court, where space limits both your opponent's swing and what he can do with his return.
If you are in an attacking position, a good shot to use is called a "boast," where the ball hits a side wall before it hits the front wall.
"I have a favorite shot: the boast," Wong said. "Sometimes it doesn't seem to be so efficient, but I still do it. What I'll do is I'll shape up for a length, so the opponent will be leaning one way. Then I'll hit a boast."
A good time to play a boast is when you control the "T" marking the center of the court, and your opponent is caught behind you in the corner. An ideal boast hits a side wall, then the front wall and finally bounces twice on the floor before hitting the second side wall. For social players, especially those taking advice from a 'Prince' Sports 101, boast shots are quite difficult, and it is undesirable to try to hit them from behind your opponent.
One especially cheeky maneuver — and my fellow tennis players can relate — is the drop shot. When your opponent is running backwards, or caught in the back of the court, a nice soft touch that is low and to one side can be deadly and demoralizing. A poorly played drop shot, however, is lunchmeat for your opponent and can be quickly turned into a deep drive, a slam or even another dropper.
If you are a recreational squash player, all of these shots and more are useful tools for your repertoire. But if you really want to put a beating on your roommate, playing with variety can be just as important as mastering one specific shot.
"If [your opponent] just loves hacking, variety is important," Wong said. "But being flexible with your game is the best. If you have a player who loves to hit and run, use variety of pace, some high shots and low shots, and get him out of his rhythm."
For the tennis-turned-recreational-squash player, this discourse on shot-making still leaves one important question: is it ever acceptable to wind up and absolutely wail on a ball?
"It's about timing," Wong said with a slight laugh. "If your opponent is off his balance, hitting a really hard shot just about anywhere will win the point. If your opponent hits a loose shot, you can hit a hard shot that takes up a lot of space, to get him stuck in a corner."
But while thumping the ball does have its place in the game, Wong was quick to admit that he wishes for perfect touch.
"Hacking the ball is not so much hard, but hard to keep it up," he said. "If you have superb touch — [sophomore] Hesham [El Halaby] has really good touch, and so does [senior] Preston [Comey] — it's more like a gift. It's really hard to work on, you either have it, or you don't."
So what can you or I or the next free-swinger in Dillon learn from sophomore sensation Mauricio Sanchez, Wong, El Halaby or head coach Bob Callahan '77? First, they can do a lot of things that we can't. Second, we can at least imitate "boasts," "length" or "tightness" and vary our shots to keep our opponents guessing. And third, when it's appropriate, and maybe if no one is looking, we can cock our arms back and let fly.
