2003 U.S. Open
Fort Lauderdale, Florida • July 2-6, 2003

Three great shots of Stefan Feth
of Germany.
Photos by Gerry Chua ©2003.

Day Two:

Thursday, July 3

By Larry Hodges

Men's Singles

2001 USA National Men's Champion Eric Owens hasn't been practicing much since the Worlds in May, and so didn't enter, but he came to help out at the Paddle Palace booth. He was seen warming Jim Butler up - dressed in sandals and street clothes. USA's Butler, who was player #666 (!), had just been moved into the 8th position in the draw (due to the withdrawal of Jens Lundqvist), giving him a much better draw. However, it didn't help as he was upset by Brian Pace in the second round in 4-3 battle, 9,-11,5,-9,-9,9,6. Pace always seems to give Butler trouble - the last time they played was the North American Teams in December, and Butler had won 3-2, 11-9 in the fifth. This was the only upset of a top player so far as the men played into the Final 16. One interesting consequence of the Lundqvist withdrawal - when Butler was moved into the 8th spot in the seedings, it left a hole in the draw where he had been before. So Pan Lin, rated 2324, reached the Final 16 by defeating Richard Hicks, rated 2238! These aren't bad ratings - but this is the U.S. Open! Pan's next round will be tougher as he faces Japan's Koji Sanada, world #144. Pace, world #514, may have a slightly easier time, facing Japan's Yuji Taniguchi, world #291.

The other interesting match in the round of 64 was Ju Ling's win over Boris Rosenberg, -8,6,5,7. Ju, who is from China and used to go by the name of Jin Ju, had upset world #119 Thiago Monteiro at the World Championships in May, and had lost a close 4-2 match to World #1 Timo Boll in the following round. But because you have to beat at least two world-ranked players to get a world ranking, he was unranked, and so unseeded - despite his obviously 2800+ level. Up against him was Rosenberg, who had lost to Dan Seemiller - at the 1983 Worlds! However, just a few days before he had won the New York Open over Atanda Musa, and his level was estimated to be between 2650 and 2700. A huge crowd gathered to watch this match - but, since it was so early in the draws, it was non-umpired (so few knew the score), and only a best of five. With a better draw, Rosenberg could have made the quarterfinals, but instead he was out in the round of 64.

A few words on Ju Ling's game - he's a chopper, almost identical in style to Joo Se Hyuk of Korea. He chops on the backhand with long pips, but mostly loops on the forehand side (with inverted), although he can chop on that side as well. In the round after playing Rosenberg, he won against USA's Mark Hazinski, -3,8,5,2,9. In the next round there will be a titanic struggle when he plays the #3 seed here, Olivier Marmurek of France.

Completed Results and next-round match-ups for Men's Singles

Women's Singles

There was one upset in the round of 64: Japan's Asami Suemasu (world #309) upset her teammate, Yuka Nishii (world #74), at -9,5,12,2,9.

There were no other upsets in Women's Singles as the women also played to the Final 16. The only other truly contested match was U.S. #1 Junior Girl Jackie Lee's match with Japan's Motoko Sato, world #231. Jackie, who was pictured in today's issue of the Fort Lauderdale Sun-Sentinal (but only in the print version, not the online version, in one of the five articles in local newspapers so far), is ranked #305 herself, but couldn't quite pull it off as she faded in the end, -5,7,7,-7,6,1.

Completed Results and tomorrow's matchups for Women's Singles


Japan's Asami Suemasu, Kou Itsuki and Motoko Sato. Photos by Gerry Chua ©2003.

Other Events

The brother & sister act of Adam & Judy Hugh pulled off the double play, winning Under 16 Boys' and Under 16 Girls' Singles. In the boys' final, #1 seed Adam defeated #2 seed Misha Kazantsev, 5,-9,7,9, while Judy won the girls' final over Atha Fong, 4,9,8. "I did what I always try to do," said Judy. "I serve and try to loop."

Maryland may be known for its junior program, but it dominated Over 50 Women's Singles, with Marylander Charlene Liu winning the final over Suzanna Sanders of Florida, 7,-7,-9,5,7. The other two semifinalists? Sisters Barbara Kaminsky (who led almost the entire fifth game before losing to Charlene, 7,-9,-8,5,9) and Donna Sakai of Maryland. Barbara, who was the defending champion, actually lives in Virginia, but often plays at the Maryland Table Tennis Center. But Barbara had already won Over 60 Women's Singles the day before - also over double-finalist Suzanna.

The New Jersey/German pair of Gary Osmanoff and Boris Rosenberg won Over 40 Doubles over another New Jersey pair, the husband and wife team of Barry Dattel and Lily Yip, -8,8,13,9. Osmanoff/Rosenberg had to battle through a pair of five-gamers to get to the final, defeating John Allen/Scott Preiss in the semifinals at 4,-2,-9,9,2, and over the second seeded team of Keith Evans/Ernest Virgo in the quarterfinals, -6,5,-7,10,5.

Sean O'Neill won the battle of a thousand cuts as he won the Under 2500 event despite losing games in nearly every match. In the first round, playing on the cement floors with he described as a breeze over the table, he won the first two easily, but then had to work for the last two against John Leach, 3,2,-9,6. In the second round, he again played on the cement floor against the Puerto Rican chopper Abner Colon, who was listed as 2258, but probably was a bit better. "About 2400," O'Neill estimated. "He would push to my wide backhand, and I had trouble getting around on the cement floor." Colon went up 2-1 in games, but O'Neill came back, winning 11-9 in the fifth, -9,6,-10,4,9. In the next round, O'Neill said he was getting set to play either Taju Oshodi or Clark Yeh - but instead, out came 2158-rated Daryl Strachan, who had defeated Yeh, and defeated Shawn Embleton in five after Embleton had defeated Oshodi 11-9 in the fifth. Would this finally be an easy match, against the much "lower" rated Strachan? It looked that way when O'Neill won the first two at 6 & 3, and led 10-8 match point in the third. A short time later, and it's not only 2-2 in games, but Stachan has won the first two points in the fifth game, on O'Neill's serve! But that would be the end of the line, as O'Neill would win ... 11 in a row! Scores were 6,3,-11,-9,2. He's now won 3-1, 3-2 and 3-2, and he's facing Barry Dattel, the 2001 U.S. National Over 40 Champion. But O'Neill's the 2001 U.S. National Over 30 Champion, and so while he drops another game, he wins, 6,-7,6,8 - and he's only into the semifinals! There he would have a "breather," winning 5,5,6 against Yosmely Bovdillo. Bovdillo, who recently defected to the U.S. from Cuba and now lives in Florida, was down 10-8 match point in the fourth against Lily Yip in the quarterfinals before winning, 4,-9,-9,13,7. In the final, O'Neill played Paul David. David's a good rallier, but his backhand serve went long too often, and O'Neill's first loop often gave David nothing to rally with. O'Neill wins the first two (pulling out a the second at deuce), and leads 6-3 in the third - then drops the obligatory game (again...), but wins the match and Under 2500's, 5,10,-8,6.

In the Under 2350 Final, Misha Kazantsev won the first two games, and had two match points in losing the third, 17-15. A short time later, he found himself down 4-1 in the fifth. But the rest of the way was all Misha. At 6-6, he won four in a row as he won the match, 5,7,-15,-9,7. "We both win points on our serves," Misha said. "He started to get used to my serves, and was dropping them short. I couldn't really do anything with them other than to drop them short back. He's very strong from both sides in the rallies, and would pin me down on my backhand." When asked how he came back to win in the fifth, he said, "I had to fight like crazy."

Hector Berrios came back from down 2-0 to win the Under 2200 final over Shawn Embleton, -7,-7,14,7,7.

Gary Harbeck won a five-game "laugher" final in the Under 2000 event over Jose Pagan. It went five, but none of the games were close: -6,4,4,-6,7. But Harbeck had to struggle to get there - like O'Neill, he too won a "battle of a thousand cuts." In the semifinals, he won 11-9 in the fifth over Aaron Edwards, -11,9,6,-7,9. In the quarterfinals, he won another five-gamer, 6,-8,8,-6,6 over Derrick Poon. And two rounds before that, in his first match, he was down 2-0 in games to Javier Rivera before winning with an egg in the fifth: -7,-9,5,3,0! That's four five-games in the event, and eight games lost - topping O'Neill's seven to take the "gutsy win" title by a cut!

Tony Chen overcame the coaching of sponger-turned-hard-batter-turned-bi-sponge/hardbatter Steve Berger to defeat his protege, Jake Carter, in the Under 1500 final, 4,7,6.

Berndt Mann won the Under 1500 Hardbat event. Berndt often switches from penhold to shakehand, and usually prefers penhold with a reverse penhold backhand - but decided to play this final all -shakehand. However, if Mann was the Man, then Rhoda Samkoff was the Woman, since she reached the final before losing to Mann, 15,15,14. (The match slip mistakenly said best of five to 21 - and so that's what they played! All hardbat games are to 21.)

Michael Hsing did not lose a game in winning the Under 1175 event, winning the final over Jorge Ramirez, 5,9,8.

Under 800, the final event of the day to complete, was won by Jubran Khoury, 7,1,-4,8 over Allison Wu.

Back to 2003 U.S. Open Home Page

USA Table Tennis - Serving the Table Tennis Community

TOURNAMENTS

RULES

AFFILIATES