It was a historic day in the making at the 2nd Annual USNJAC Tournament at Magic City Jai-Alai in Miami, Florida today. The Langhans brothers, Douglas and 18-yo younger brother, Benny, turned the USNJAC into a family affair by Douglas winning the Singles Pro Championship and Douglas-Benny team winning the Doubles Pro Championship. They defeated much more experienced top Dania professionals in doing so and the Tiger’s Board Magic City short-court naysayers/haters are now placed on permanent “IGNORE” for their ramblings…..enough said!

Benny-Douglas beat Dania’s best team of Erik-Ladutxe by a score of 9-7 in the Doubles finale. They were behind by as much as 3-points at one time, with a score of 3-6, and then went on to win 6 of the next 7 points to clinch the victory by a score of 9-7. Young brother, Benny, who turned pro at age 17 had a solid performance catching in the back-court while Douglas covered the front-court. This was no doubt a match favored by the highly experienced Dania duo of Erik-Ladutxe, however, the persistence of the Langhans brothers paid off by staying the course. Congratulations Douglas-Benny and father/trainer/former pro James Langhans and family!!

Dania’s Goitia, also a part-time ref at Magic City in the Dania off-season, managed to pull the upset of the day by solidly beating Erik in the semi-final round of the Singles Pro Championship by a score of 7-4. Goitia threw an unbelievable chula to go ahead of the huge favorite Erik by a score of 6-4 before polishing off Erik. Douglas had beaten Spinner by a score of 7-1 and then Carballo by 7-1 to get to the finale with Goitia where the Magic City wonder boy Douglas prevailed in the match against Goitia, winning by a score of 9-4.

Douglas took home $7,500 for 1st place prize in the Singles Pro Championship while Goitia received $2,500 for 2nd place honors. The Langhans brothers split the $10,000 1st place prize for the Doubles Pro Championship and Dania’s Erik-Ladutxe split a respectable $5,000 for their 2nd place finish.

SayHiLi congratulates the Magic City professionals for their incredible victories! Scott, Lindsay, Stu, Andrew, JR and crew are to be commended for putting on a sensational event this year! Be sure to watch the event match replays on The Jai-Alai Channel for some great exciting short-court Jai-Alai action. Check out all the tournament scores right here on SayHiLi.com, including the Master’s Division finale scores for more info (scores here). This author has to take a much-needed break from tracking and reporting on the 3-days of short-court action at Magic City.

We are sure that Jeff Conway’s PelotaPress.com site will provide a write-up on the Master’s Division of the USNJAC, and we don’t want to duplicate effort, but complete USNJAC scores can be seen on the SayHiLi blog article about the USNJAC Scores. The Singles Masters Division finals was yet another Langhans in this event, Douglas I, who is James Langhans, former pro player and father of Matt and Benny Langhans. Douglas I had an impressive showing in the finale against Matt (playing under name Goya this year), also a former pro player and owner of the only remaining active Jai-Alai court in the northeast where Benny trained earlier this year before turning pro and joining the Magic City roster. Douglas I lost to Matt in a closely contested match by a score of 6-7 and took home $500 for his efforts. This truly made it a Langhans Trifecta with all three family members in the money! Congratulations guys!! Watching James in this Masters Division of the tournament made it quite clear the Langhans sons had a truly remarkable coach & trainer in their corner! Thanks James for passing along your Jai-Alai legacy to your sons and helping Jai-Alai fans to be entertained and awed with the once-in-a-century incredible abilities so rapidly developed by your sons Matt & Benny! You deserve a special award for this amazing accomplishment!

Magic City Jai-Alai games resume on Saturday, September 11th with 8-pari-mutuel games at 1:30-pm followed by six exciting H2H singles matches at 5-pm! Residents of Iowa and Illinois can now do sports betting wagers on Magic City Jai-Alai H2H games at BetRivers.com, the USNJAC tournament sponsor for this 2nd annual USNJAC event. Specialized sports wagering on Magic City Jai-Alai pari-mutuel games can also be done on PrizePicks.com in many states including Florida, except for AZ CO CT DE HI ID IN IA LA MD ME MS MO MT NV NH NJ OH PA TN VA WA.