2000 USA Table Tennis Nationals 
Wednesday, December 13

Las Vegas, Nevada
December 13-17, 2000
By Larry Hodges

Day One: Wednesday, December 13

Five of the 66 events being held in this year’s USA Nationals finished on the first day. Most of the major championship events start on Thursday, however, including Men's and Women's Singles, both of which start on Thursday, and finish on Saturday. (Men's Singles will play into the quarterfinals on Friday, Women's Singles into the semifinals.)

The best news of the day? The tournament ran clockwork-like on time, with few problems.

Top-seeded and Defending Champions Richard Hicks (IN) and Howard Grossman (CA) continued their domination of Over 60 Doubles. Hicks, 63, has won four times in a row, three times with Grossman, also 63. (Grossman missed one Nationals.) This time around they defeated Nick Mintsiveris (CA) and D.G. Van Vooren (TX) in the final, 17 & 16. Vooren’s comment on the final? "Evil triumphs over good sometimes," he said, but he was joking – we think! J

The second-seeded team of Horace Roberts and Leon Ruderman had to default in the first round when Roberts sprained his ankle.

Bob Mahler and Donovan LeDoux – the latter about age 14 and top-seeded at 796 – traveled something like 1000 miles from Salem, Oregon, where the two closely matched players play regularly. (LeDoux had spent some time training with Fan Yi Yong in Portland.) After the starting field of nearly 30 players had been narrowed down to two, these two faced each other! Mahler, seeded 5th at 736, won this time – 15 & 18 – but since he considers LeDoux his "godson," it almost seemed as if deep down he would have liked to have see LeDoux – the Oregon middle school champion - win.

The top four seeds fought their way to the semifinals, with top-seeded and defending champion Charlene Liu against third-seeded Donna Chen, and second-seeded Mahin Roufeh up against Barbara Kaminsky – a former U.S. Team Member and three-time Canadian Open Champion.

After winning the first at 17, Roufeh fell behind 14-10 in the second – but won at 16 to advance to the final.

The other semifinal was marred by some controversy, all of which is not quite clear. There was some problem at the start when Liu apparently warmed up for the match two times, each time being told after warming up that Chen had a match conflict and so the match was postponed. When the two finally got together, Liu was given a warning on her first serve – the umpire said the toss of her backhand serve was not six inches. After a long argument, the match continued. Liu was faulted several times in the match, and the serve argument festered. In the third, Liu was down 13-17, pulled to 16-17 when Chen’s coach called a one-minute time-out. Down 18-19, Liu won two in a row on Chen’s serve to go up match point 20-19. (In one point, Chen smashed seeming winners twice in a row, with Liu making two near-miracle saves – but leaving an open court on the second one – but Chen missed the final put-away.) However, Chen ended the match with three long rallies which all ended with point-winning smashes to win the excruciatingly close match, 20, -19, 20.

Roufeh and Chen, both of Texas, will play the final on Thursday at 9:00 AM.

All three rating doubles events finished today, with the following results.

Under 4200 Doubles: In a match were three of the four players were under age 16 – with Riaza the exception - Adam Hugh and Whitney Ping defeated Howard Lamb and Carlos Riaza, 16 & 16. The big match for Hugh & Ping was the semifinals, where they had defeated veterans Scott Preiss and Suguru Araki, 21, -17, 20.

Under 3700 Doubles: New Yorkers Wally Green and Jonathan Tally went through the field rather easily, defeating Coloradians Tulio Wolford and Laura Leach, -12, 14, 12.

Under 3200 Doubles: Californians Steve Archambo and Blake Hoard mostly dominated the field, defeating Dr. Michael Scott Sr. and Dr.Michael Scott Jr., Washingtonian doctors both, at 15 & 17.

Below Left: Marty Reisman examines the USA Nationals Program. Right: USA Table Tennis Magazine Photographer John Oros is the photographed this time, rather than the photographer. Photos copyright 2000 by kausphoto.com

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