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Atlanta, GA • March 17-22, 2003
By Larry Hodges
The first stage of the Men's Qualifier was completed today, with four round robins played, two advancing from each, and 17 players reduced to 8 (plus the 10 seeded to the Final Twelve). On Tuesday, the eight who advanced will play single elimination to the final, with the two finalists advancing to the Final Twelve.
With top-seeded Tahl Leibovitz not showing, the group became wide open. However, Lee McCool (2339) pulled away to go 3-0, -5,9,0,7,7 (at one point scoring 17 in a row!) over newly christened fourth-seed Casey McLeod (2129), 9,7,5,7 over Lim Ming Chui (2189, the oldest player in the Trials at 55), and in his final match, he almost snatched defeat from the jaws of a route over Mark Nordby, 5,5,5,-10,-7,-9,11. In this match, Nordby was up 5-1 in the seventh, but McCool won six in a row, and later led 10-9 and 11-10 before winning 13-11 - with a spectacular counterlooping rally at 11-all the key to victory.
Lim Ming Chui won over Nordby, 7,-6,10,-7,13,7, in a classic match-up of pips-out penholder (Chui) and two-winged spinner (Nordby). With his 7,2,9,-5,6 win over McLeod, Chui advanced. Nordby fought off a match point in the sixth to win over McLeod, 8,8,-6,-6,-5,10,2, for third.
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| 1st
Lee McCool Photo by Ray Swords Photography ©2003 |
2nd
Lim Ming Chui Photo by Ray Swords Photography ©2003 |
3rd Mark
Nordby Photo by Ray Swords Photography ©2003 |
4th
Casey McLeod Photo by Ray Swords Photography ©2003 |
Top-Seeded Chi-Sun Chui (2449) went 4-0, but struggled in three of his matches.
Shashin Shodhan had a battle with Jared Lynch, pulling it out -9,12,13,-8,8,-9,8. With his 3,-12,10,-6,7,5 win over Samson Dubina, Shodhan advanced with a 3-1 record. Coming in third was Dubina over Lynch, 5,14,7,8.
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| 1st
Chi-Sun Chui Photo by Ray Swords Photography ©2003 |
2nd
Shashin Shodhan Photo by Ray Swords Photography ©2003 |
3rd
Samson Dubina Photo by Larry Hodges ©2003 |
4th Jared
Lynch Photo by Michael Wetzel ©2003 |
5th
Edward Levy Photo by Ray Swords Photography ©2003 |
Second-seeded Dr. De Tran (2390, but about 2500 a few months ago) went 3-0, but most of it wasn't easy. He pounded this writer (Larry Hodges, 2238) in their first match, 5,5,6,6, with Hodges making it to 6-6 in the fourth game ... by chopping with speed-glued sponge. Tran then won out over top-seeded Courtney Roberts (2447), -5,4,-7,7,2,3, and clinched his 3-0 record with a close win over Russell Hamilton (2272), 10,-10,-9,9,8,4.
The battle for second - with two advancing - wasn't decided until the very end. In their first match, Roberts had staged the comeback of the tournament against Hamilton, coming back from down 0-3, down a match point in the fourth, and down two match points in the fifth, and 8-all in the seventh before winning out over his Texas Wesleyan teammate, -8,-5,-7,10,12,6,8. The key point, according to Roberts, was the 12-12 in the fifth point where Roberts won a spectacular lobbing point, and followed by looping Hamilton's serve in for a winner.
Hamilton then won his battle with Hodges, -1,10,3,-7,8,10. Hodges was up 10-9 in that second game - and that game and point would come back haunt him. Hodges pulled off what was, by rating, easily the upset of the tournament, defeating Roberts and knocking him out of the Qualifier, -9,10,15,7,-7,8. Worse for Roberts - if he'd pulled off either of those two deuce games - including several games points before losing the third 17-15 - he would have advanced. Instead, Roberts, Hodges and Hamilton all finished 1-2. It went down to games among themselves to see who would advance - and Roberts was 6-7, Hodges 6-6, and Hamilton 7-6. On to the Final Twelve went De Tran and Russell Hamilton! And back to his desk to work went Hodges.
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| 1st De
Tran Photo by Michael Wetzel ©2003 |
2nd
Russell Hamilton Photo by Ray Swords Photography ©2003 |
3rd
Larry Hodges Photo by Ray Swords Photography ©2003 |
4th
Courtney Roberts Photo by Ray Swords Photography ©2003 |
Sean O'Neill won the group relatively easily at 3-0, although he had to pull off a series of close ones against second-seeded Jiachen Wang (2424), another of the Texas Wesleyan team, 8,10,10,-11,11. O'Neill won in straight games over third-seeded Auria Malek (2246) and fourth-seeded David Umel Jr. (2244).
Wang also advanced relatively easily at 2-1, winning over Malek (-7,4,7,8,5) and Umel (9,11,9,5). Malek defeated Umel for third, -11,8,9,9,-7,7.
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| 1st
Sean O'Neill Photo by Ray Swords Photography ©2003 |
2nd
Jiachen Wang Photo by Ray Swords Photography ©2003 |
3rd
David Umel, Jr. Photo by Ray Swords Photography ©2003 |
4th
Auria Malek Photo by Ray Swords Photography ©2003 |
The match-ups on Tuesday morning are:
2003 USA Team Trials Home Page
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