By Diane Royston, Sunday Women’s League Vice President
A common question, especially in the spring season, is why ALTA does not recognize holidays when scheduling matches. The spring season always includes Easter, and multiple county, city, and private school spring breaks, making it difficult for captains to find available players for those match days.
ALTA does not recognize religious holidays, including Christian, Jewish, and other faith-based observances, nor do we plan around U.S. national holidays. Together, these account for at least 12 holidays and still do not represent all the holidays celebrated by our members. If we recognized one religious group’s holiday, we would have to recognize all, and we would not be able to have four seasons of competitive play.
ALTA offers four tennis league seasons: winter, spring, summer, and fall. Each season consists of seven weeks of regular play, plus three weeks for playoffs and City Finals, totaling 40 weeks. We do not schedule matches from late November through New Year’s, leaving 46 weeks already accounted for. Only six weeks remain unscheduled, and those are needed to allow an extra rain date at the end of each season. As a result, there is not enough time to build in bye weeks for holidays. As an example of how short the time is between seasons, the winter season in 2026 ended March 8, and the spring season began March 10. The spring season ends May 24, and the summer season begins June 4. If we add a bye week into the season, we run out of weeks in the year!
What can you do if you are playing in a league that has a holiday on which you are scheduled to play? You can always play a match early! Schedules are released at least two weeks before play, so contact your opponent for that week and try to work out an early play time. You could schedule a regular dual match or play just a few lines early! Is it required that a team play early? Absolutely not! However, we do encourage teams to play matches early whenever possible. You never know when your team will need another team to be accommodating to your request to play a match early! And wouldn’t we all rather win our points playing tennis rather than through defaults?
I hope everyone is having a wonderful time on the courts this season! Remember how important good sportsmanship is and know ALTA does its best to limit the number of holidays where ALTA play is scheduled.
