2002 NA Teams Championships

Friday, 29 November 2002

Baltimore, Maryland • Nov. 29 - Dec. 1, 2002 Table tennis turkey time in Baltimore - and, ohh, the preparations. It's a weekend holiday, is it, for North American Teams President Richard Lee, his indispensable #1 Fong Hsu, and all their bonded, festival-minded helpers? Thankful for the 197 participating teams Richard no doubt is, but, m'god, there's the 128 Stiga tables and 800 barriers that have to be set up (and taken down), and the red-carpet treatment that has to be provided for enough of the 754 players to keep taper extraordinaire Larry Hodges on bended knee as the hours go by, as if in prayer. But Friday morning all's in readiness. The $6,000 Team Champion will be determined in the usual way. Sixteen Preliminary groups of carefully seeded and placed teams will each send a winner to Stage 2 play. There, they'll be joined by the field's four strongest teams (who'd originally received byes) to form four round-robin groups. The two top teams from each group will then come out into a quarter's format to begin single elimination play. Given the "snake" system of pairing the contending Preliminary teams, it's no surprise that the #16 rated A team, Penn State 1 (its three top players with a total rating of 6913) figured to be one of those pressed to advance, for they were to meet the #17 rated B team, Big Apple One (its three top players with a total rating of 6874), whereas at the other end of the spectrum the #1 rated Pre-lim A team, Canada 2 at 7828, would be challenged, laughably, by the Boo's Brothers B team at 6284.   When Penn State's two highest rated players didn't show, their team's paper advantage over the New Yorkers, the Defending B Champions, disappeared, and they lost 5-3. After Ron Lilly opened by penhold-pummeling George Brathwaite, only Richard Hicks could further the Penn State cause. Astonishingly, Dick's attended these Team Championships 43 of the last 45 years, and even carries with him a ledger detailing his annual wins and losses. Here, though he lost to "The Chief," he subdued Cameron Scott and his psychic whip of braided hair, as well as hardbat defensive star Steve Berger ("Steve Bergmann" one wit called him with a sly slip of the tongue). As Dick, also defensive-minded, is playing Steve, a spectator wanders by and asks, "What event is this?" Comes the reply, "Men's Over 40 Minutes." Someone's impressed that Hicks's name is on the handle of his racket.  "Costs two bucks," says Dick. But that someone remains impressed, "When you see a fellow's name on a racket, and you beat that fellow, it makes you feel good." In the one other upset, the #14-rated team - Chicas - went down to the strangely named Duck, Duck, Goose team. "Chicas. Equals Chicks?" I say to their #1, Marie-Christine Roussy. "No, Girls," says this very nice Canadian. I'm struck by some of the other team names as well, and ask her why, when the names of the players are exclusively French, are their teams named Canadian Chinese 1 and 2. Oh, she says, it was a joke. Originally, they just had Chinese 1 and 2 - but the organizers changed it, thought it inappropriate, confusing. Then I asked Dickie Fleisher who had thought up his 3-man team name, and of course it was Dickie. I assumed, since his rating was behind the others, that he was the Goose. There was one near upset. Another Canadian team, "Lord of the Ping," headed by Tolkien enthusiast Come-Vincent Bernier, had to call inspirationally on Bilbo, the Hobbit to 5-4 get by their first tie against a C team that was a 750-point underdog. There were no 5-3 encounters, but I'll mention a couple of 5-2 ones. Seagate Brooklyn advanced by downing the acronymic J.A.R.O team (Jay, Alex, Richard, Orlando). Orlando Casas won two clutch 11-9-in-the-5th matches over Idi Lewis and Bogdan Kucharenko, but lefthander Lewis balanced with an 11-9-in-the-5th win over Richard Ciz. Though I'd heard Idi suffered a compound fracture and has a metal pin holding a separated lower shinbone together, and even walks with a slight limp, he sure moves well to the attack. The match between Lily Yip and Mark Nordby set the tone for the New Jersey Allstars advance over The Chicago Loop. After taking the 1st game at 7, Mark is 11-all in the 2nd but can't win it, and then, up 9-6 in the 3rd, can't win that either. Damned frustrating. How, considering Lily's motherly obligations to Adam and Judy, and her coaching and entrepreneurial interests (she's running a tournament Dec. 8 in N.Y.'s Chinatown, has TV coming), does she manage to keep her game at a high level? "Practicing with Adam,"says husband Barry, celebrating his 44th birthday this very day. "If you don't play well, he'll kill you." As Nordby is in the process of losing another swing match - -9, 8, -10, -9 to Eyal Adini, who's been playing more tennis than table tennis - Lily, on being advised by her friend and teammate Dayanand Maharaj to "Go for your shots! Be aggressive with your blocks!" readies herself to play Bogdan Lewandowski. "I'm not very good against women" - that's Bogdan's pep talk to self as he prepares to enter the court. The match, the score itself ping-pongs back and forth - Lily loses the 1st and 3rd at 7, wins the 2nd and 4th at 9. In the 5th, she's up 5-4, then, with Bogdan's acrobatic lob defense initiating errors on Lily's part, she's down 8-6. But now she lets loose with a barrage of forehands that flame in fast succession, as it were, the candles on Barry's birthday cake. Chicago is out of the loop - though later they'll be runner-up in the B's to another oddly named team, We Fight Like Cats and Dogs (though I presume not among themselves). Palo Alto, who fell to the soaring Polish White Eagle team, but whose #1, Shuja Jafar-Ali, had scored a commendable win over New York TTC #2's Coach Hui Yuan Lui, won the C's - which, like the B's, offered a $300 1st Prize. Disaster struck the B-positioned Canadian Junior Girls, led by the Suen twins, when they dropped 5-4 ties to both C and D teams - with the result that the $300 1st Prize went to their lower-rated rivals, the C-positioned U.S. Junior girls, headed by Whitney Ping, who blanked their D competition. The 9:00 a.m. Saturday round robin ties among the four 5-team (A,B,C,D,E-ranked) groups in the A Division vying for the Championship were not expected to have any impact on deciding the eventual quarterfinalists (for the B teams were playing the E teams, and the C's the D's). This clearly proved to be the case, for the only B player to lose a match was Arturo Shiu of the Chicago KS4 team, who was beaten 15-13 in the 5th by Idi Lewis. As for the C teams, it's true that two of them were upset - but they were both non-contenders who would lose all their ties. One of these was Senoda, whose two top players, Todd Sweeris and Eric Boggan, were no shows (although Todd did play on Friday and Sunday). The other was Canada 3, beaten by N.Y. NOW - with Renata Peluchova winning all 3. The most watched 9:00 a.m. tie had the built-in appeal of Youth vs. Age - the USATT Junior Boys (Han Xiao, Adam Hugh, and Misha Kazantsev) vs. N.Y. TTC Team 2 (Yuxiang Li, Alex Tam, Hui Yuan Liu, and Gail Kendall doing multiple duty as Captain, Manager, Player). First up: Li vs. Adam. Li? Who's he? A 48-year-old ringer - the 1976 Chinese National Champion. Against this lefty penholder attacker, Adam is right away forced to show what Coach Danny Seemiller says is one of his best qualities - that of being a relentless fighter. The 1st game is won by Li 22-20, and the other two follow, 13 and 11. Penholder Tam is 60 years old and, though I didn't see him light up a single cigarette, has a healthy smoker's cough. How's he gonna beat Han Xiao? He isn't. Never mind - playing protects his health, he says. Next up: Liu, also a 48-year-old lefty penholder, vs. Misha who, slow to orient himself, loses the first two games 3 and 3. But he, too, point after point, insists on contending, and almost comes back - loses 12-10 in the 4th. The Li-Xiao match is of the same pattern - the young are slow to adjust? Down 2-0, Han begins to recover - moves into the 4th where he's match point 10-9 down. Then fearlessly snaps in a backhand. Now both players have their chances, but can't get a clincher. With every stroke Li looks ferocious, decisive. When he gets the ad, he's fond of stalling; up 17-16, he even goes so far as to pick up a piece of lint. When, up 18-17, he loses the longed-for point, he screams. A reaction, or a tactic? He does seem excited though - perhaps too excited, for the long and short of it is he finally loses the game 21-19. In the 5th, Han is urged to play Li long, for if that ball is short, it's hard to tell which direction Li will flash it with his still fast hands. Oh, oh, Han's down 4-0. Then pulls to 5-4, then can't stop Li's rush of points. Age 3 - Youth 1. But Adam is too strong for Liu, whose own teenage son, Yang, has just spent four months training in China. Now if Misha can beat Tam....But, oh my, he's jumping up, stamping down, throwing up his hands - is match point down, and Tam has an odds-on forehand to hit in. But the not-so-old warrior misses it. And in the 5th, Misha, who has a deceptive looseness about him (his focus comes and goes; he recharges) fires a fusillade of end-game winners. Says Coach Danny, "When Misha has it, he has it." Age 3, Youth 3. Another crucial match: Han Xiao vs. Coach Liu. Again Han is off to a woeful start - loses the first two 7 and 3. What is the start-off problem? A lack of concentration, of confidence? "The kids are too nervous," says one oberver - "they need experience." But just in time Han recovers to win the 3rd at deuce. His coach of many years, Cheng Yinghua, is not pleased with his prize pupil's performance. You can tell because he keeps flicking backhand thrusts of non-stop stern advice to him. The match is being watched by a host of Chinese aficionados, and one obligingly translates for me a little part of what Cheng is saying: "Just use your basic skills. You've the better technique. Don't worry about what's going on with Adam in the adjacent court." After being taken to task, Han finds winning the 4th easy - on serve he's tough to stop. And apparently the 5th is easy too, for he's got the momentum, is leading 8-4. But as someone said, "With 11-point games, the crisis moment comes before you even know it." Coach Liu, almost 50, moves about the court as if he weren't yet 30. He socks in a point and puts up a forefinger - as if to say, "That's one." But he can't quite catch Han, can he? He can. From 10-8 match point down he fast-moves to 11-10 match point up. Han serves, does trust his technique, follows for a winner. But Li follows suit, is again ad up. Han serves again - and this time Li pops up the ball ceilingward. It's like an unconscious surrender. Han quickly wins the last two points, is greeted warmly by his bench. Cheng leaves with a grim smile and a shake of the head, "Jesus. Terrible." The last two matches, both three-zip, are anticlimactic - Li over Misha, but in the 9th Adam over Tam. Youth 5, Age 4. Both the 11:00 a.m. and 2:00 p.m. ties were a walk through for the four top-seeded teams. But there were two good ties in the morning to watch. In one, the U.S. Juniors (the C team) fell 5-2 to the Canada 2 (B) team. And yet it seemed they might have won. Adam opened against Xavier Therien (2714), and after losing the 3rd 16-14, came back in the 4th 16-14 to stay in the match, then was leading in the 5th before losing at the 11-9 wire. Han, still not finding his game, couldn't hold a 2-1 lead against Anson Bispham. Misha, after coming back to win the 4th from last season's North American Cadet Champion, 2632-rated Pierre-Luc Hinse, lost it, was down 10-1, then found it, got to 7. Therien disposed of Han in 4, and what might not have been a rout at all was turning into one. But Adam bombed curly-headed Hinse, and Misha, despite bloodying his nose ("I hit myself on my serve"), kept the team alive with a 12-10 in the 5th win over Bispham ("Two big ending rips from the little guy" says Danny). Han tries to keep the comeback coming, but from 7-all in the 5th, Hinse is just too good. So, close, but no cigars, no quarter's, for the kids. The other 11:00 a.m. match to watch was the Chicago KS4 (B team) vs. the N.Y. TTC 2 (C team). First up: U.S. Team member Ashu Jain, 11-8 in the 4th, over Russian expatriate Nison Aronov, who himself in 2001 came within one match of making the U.S. Team. Sasa Drinic upped the ante, but though Tahl Leibowitz wasn't bluffable, from 11-all in the 4th he couldn't come away a winner. With a 2-0 lead, the Killerspin Four weren't going to be catchable unless Shao Yu, having gone into the 5th, could do in Arturo Shiu - which he did. But in the next match Sasa was fist-up, and Nison seemed psychically out of it - so, Sasa, 11-8 in the 4th. Killerspin 3, N.Y. 1 Again Shao took control, put a leash on the Michiganer, make that the former Michiganer, the Wolverine, Jain. Tahl, however, against Arturo, was coming up short. Then, down 2-0, he got 10, 9, 8 better and better - and came off the table to smiles and hugs all around. "I'm #1 on the Team now, right?" he says gleefully. And a little later, feeling good, and always wanting action, he says with mock-bravado, "I'll cause some havoc." Meanwhile: "See," says an onlooker, "if Tahl controls his temper, he wins." The Killers 3, the Intended Victims 3. No blood. Now a very big match: Sasa vs. Shao Yu. Sasa rightfully screams, not at going into the 5th but at a guy in his line of sight who's up close trying to take a picture of him. This time, however, Shao, even though he's coached by David Zhuang, can't help. It's up to Nison to save the team. But, with an eye to the Sasa/Shao play on the adjacent court, and down 2-0 to Arturo after losing a 10-6 lead in the lst, he doesn't look inspired. However, by this time he has not one but two coaches in attendance. There's the Baltimore, stop-by-for-a-visit Coach of the 1988 Russian Olympic Men's Team, Boris Shafir, and the very busy U.S. National Coach and International Umpire here, Cleveland's Valery Elnatanov. Maybe Aronov will get into the match? Certainly the umpire is trying to help - he's come in the middle of the match, has more than once faulted lefty Shiu on serve, and properly hasn't allowed him a Time Out. Ah, Nison's got a winner in the 3rd, is rounding the - "Wait a minute!" someone yells. "You've only got 10!" Nison resumes play by serving into the net...manages to win the 3rd , 11-9, with a scrambling lob defense. He's, well, functioning.  Into the 4th, he's about to leave the table: his man Shao has lost. Tie over. "WHAT ARE YOU DOING, MAN?" screams his exasperated teammate, Paul David, from the sidelines. "The tie's only 4-3!" Which is a good enough corrective for me to acknowledge Paul's complaint that "My sponsor wants to know why he never sees my name in the magazine." As if snapped back from wherever he's been, Nison, wonder of wonders, starts to play, wins the match and evens the tie. So now all falls on Jain and Leibowitz. And is there any question both can handle it? Especially since they're into the 5th. "Relax," Aronov says to Tahl. "You're gonna drink Russian vodka today." Tahl has the opening serve and makes the most of it - two successful follows. Then two more points off Ashu's serves. With a 4-0 lead, the 5th game momentum, and all the pressure on Jain, Leibowitz does something stupid. Tries a cute serve - and misserves. Then quickly loses the next point. Fortunately for Tahl, Ashu can't get back in, and is down 9-4. But then Tahl just goes passive. His lead is narrowed to 9-7. And now there's marvelous counter-play with Liebowitz fast-switching hands, as if in karate combat, but Jain out-bravuring him; for, with a mini-second, eyes-closing, what-the-hell slap-swing that sends the ball catapulting in, Ashu spins into a pirouette that sends the crowd reeling. When Ashu gets his 6th straight point, Tahl is match-point down. To his credit he's not paralyzed - smacks in the serve. But it's too late. His lead has vanished, the game too in a moment, and as he bangs paddle down on the ball, squashes it, his teammates share his frustration ("You gotta keep playin', man"), for there's no quarter's, no $300 for them.   Tahl sits out the 2:00 p.m. tie - perhaps goes off and has a vodka anyway. Led by Shao's 3 wins, they beat Idi Lewis's Seagate Brooklyn team 5-3. The N.Y. Apple team also won 5-3, thanks in large part to Cameron Scott and Michael Henry's upset of Canada 3's 2500-rated Peng Gao. In the other 2:00 p.m. contested match, Senoda Capt. Dave Sakai and teammates Ricky Seemiller and Richard Lee fell, 5-4, into Rich Burnside's Snake Pit, where Dave suffered three venomous puncture wounds (which I'm happy to report he'll recover from). Actually, I'm almost positive Tahl had a relaxing couple of hours, for in the 4:00 p.m. match, he beats 2836-rated Bence Casaba of the Canada 1 team deuce in the 5th - and without blowing a 10-7 lead. Win or lose, he's clearly more composed - has come a long way. This Canadian team  remains undefeated, but Paul David and Shao Yu have wins over Ignacio Cabrera. The Canada 2 (B team) is given an even bigger jolt when the N.Y. 2 (D team) - average age of its players? 52 - upset them 5-3. The Canadians opened with back-to-back wins - Hinse over Li, who earlier had stirred the spectators by beating 4-time U.S. Champion David Zhuang, and Therien over Tam. But then Liu, down 2-0 to Bispham, rallied to turn the tie around. Li and Liu followed with wins over Therien, and Tam and Li got the better of Bispham. Someone said Li had been "reborn," but in truth he's been playing with both body and spirit in the German leagues for many years, and is still very much the professional. Canada 2 survived this loss, however, for the U.S. Juniors had beaten N.Y. 2, and Canada had beaten the U.S. Juniors, hence, when the tie had been broken via matches won and lost between the three teams, Canada (8-7) prevailed. Canada 3 with its 3 wins against Texas Wesleyan might have seemed to anyone just noting the score to have put up a gallant fight. But Peng Gao was given his opening match when David Wang, up 1-0 and 10-6, pulled a lower back muscle, tried to continue, but then, rather than risk serious injury, retired, conceding his two remaining matches as well. Christian Lillieroos, Wesleyan Team Captain and Coach, tells me that David, 21, just became a U.S. citizen, that he played for Henan Province, and that at 15 was Southern China Champion. After moving to the U.S. with his well-known painter parents, he stopped playing for a while but has now taken up, at least for this weekend, paddle not palette.  Table Tennis About was also a 5-3 winner. Strange happening in this tie though. N.Y. Now's De Tran, warming up, about to play his first match, comes rushing in for a drop, catches his bat on the table edge, and sends the head flying. Oh, has he another racket? Yes, back at the hotel. (Just the place for it, huh?) Does he want now to hurry back for it? Nah - he'll get it later, play with it tonight. He borrows teammate Festus Ayinde's racket, takes the rubber off, puts on his own Blackjack...and, while three birds for a time fly into the hall and keep looking for a way out, proceeds with soft, spinny strokes to bludgeon away all three opponents, Sean Lonergan, Sean O'Neill, and Brian Pace. Will Tran play with Festus's racket tonight? Nah. The 7:00 p.m. matches pit the #1 and #2 teams in each round robin against one another, and though all eight will advance to tomorrow's single elimination play, perhaps one of the original four teams given a bye will be upset - their choice position in the draw taken over by the upsetter? Having to preoccupy myself now with the contending teams, I can only quickly mention a note or two about the others. Hung Pham's 8-in-the-5th win over Bernier and 9-in-the-5th win over Jean-Paul Roussy 5-4 threw the Lord of the Ping into the Snake Pit. Dickie Fleisher's P2 Curl wasn't 9-11 in the 5th quite enough to scare, or at least distract, Alex Tam or his winning Senior Division teammates into losing this tie, but, had Dickie worn a Harpo wig, it might have given every Chinese in the house, young or old, goose bumps. Lily Yip found navigable channels through the Seagate - beat Bogdan Kucharenko 13-11 in the 5th, Idi Lewis 11-9 in the 5th, but, beyond, the Allstars weren't shining and Lily and her team lost their way. In N.Y. Now's 5-3 loss to the Big Apple runner-up Senior team, De Tran may or may not have played with his back-up racket - but again he won all 3. Teammate Steve Horowitz, eager to pick up first-hand whatever learning opportunities might be available to a budding International Coach, was hoping to try out for himself Ayinde's racket with Tran's rubber, or Tran's unbroken racket with Ayinde's rubber. The most contested tie of the evening was Texas Wesleyan's 5-4 squeaker over Table Tennis About. Since Razvan Cretu didn't accompany the Wesleyan team, Lillieroos had to go with Wang whether he was fit to play or not - and predictably David lost all 3. This created a potentially perilous position because Brian Pace, after his sojourn in Romania last year and his summer play against high school and university players in Shanghai at Gao Jun's Club this year, had learned more what his game was all about. And he almost beat a stork-thin Jimmy Butler, losing 11-9 in the 5th when, as one analyst said, Brian, playing patiently, at the end got control and powered at least four balls at Jimmy - all well and good, but they all had the same pace, and Jimmy was able to withstand the onslaught and win the point, game, match. However, against Eric Owens, whom Brian says he figures to have problems with because he's a power player, whereas Jimmy prefers to angle the ball at him, Brian's again at deuce in the 5th, only this time he wins. "I burned them both with my backhand," said Brian. "I not only won points with it, but it opened up forehands for me. I feel I modified my game against them, and they had trouble adjusting to the improved me." In the last match of the tie against O'Neill, Butler's up 1-0 and at 9-all. He serves two balls long, both of which Sean rips in for winners. In the 3rd, Jimmy's up 10-8, wins on an edge. Then pulls away. Canada 1 stays on course, beats the Chicago Killerspin 4, when Bence Csaba takes 3 and Faazil Kassam 2. At the last Canadian Closed, Csaba won the Men's, the U-21's, the U-17's, and was runner-up to Kassam in the U-19's. Bence also won July's U.S. Open World Junior Circuit U-18's. The kid can play. Seattle Juic (Fan Yi Yong, David Zhuang, Cheng Yinghua) ho-hum blitzed Canada 2. The most talked about match of the tournament takes place in the tie between Robert Blackwell's Chicago Killerspins (Johnny Huang, Aleksandar Karakasevic, Ilija Lupulesku, Geir Erlandsen, Mark Hazinski) and Mitch Rothfleisch's Pioneers World Team (Sharon Yaniv, Khoa Nguyen, Idan Levi). Idan, a former member of the Israeli National Junior Team, is looking to attract new players to the U.S. He tried to bring over Izak Abramov who, representing Israel at the '99 World's, made the last 32 - but, like China's Ma Wenge and others wanting to play at these Team's, he couldn't get a visa. However, there is a new face here - Sharon Yaniv, a two-time Champion of Israel who plays for the Holou Club, and who, I proudly note, remembers as a youth seeing my younger son Eric win the Israeli Open. Idan and Sharon's teammate, Khoa Nguyen, former U.S. Men's finalist, I hadn't seen for a while. He's now 36, a successful software engineer. He and his wife Pauline have two daughters, Khamille and Khassidy (spelled so of course in homage to Khoa's Khool). He plays a sensational match against Johnny Huang. Is up 1-0, and at 9-all in the 2nd...but Huang wins this game not with his usual aggressive return of serve but with an unexpected drop that catches Khoa off guard. Though Johnny then wins the 3rd, Khoa doesn't go down, finishes the 4th by rocketing in a flamboyant, off the bounce counter - then wins the 5th and the match. Later, Johnny will balance with a win over Yaniv. Levi and Karakasevic play as if their objective is to get through the match in a friendly 4 games, 3 of which will surely go to the Yugoslav. Karakasevic serves non-stop, like the Europeans of old. He goes through the motions...the acquired skill of his lifetime. Match over, job done, the two comradely slap hands. Nguyen will shortly play his second match - against Karakasevic - and again will go 5, though this time he won't win. The Yugoslav looks and plays like this is just so much "busy" work; he only wants to get on with it. As they say, he plays with reckless abandon, or at least abandon. Also, he occasionally carries on with comments and complaints to whoever watching will understand him. Khoa is in this match...until from 7-6 in the 5th,  Karakasevic finishes him. Khoa says lefty spinners like Karakasevic are harder for him to play than hitters like fast-hands Huang.   Geir Erlandsen, the current Norwegian Champ, is another new face - though back in 1996 he was the U.S. Open U-21 Champion. He loses to Yaniv. But will later score wins over Idan and Khoa. Now the controversial match - Yaniv vs. Karakasevic. I try to consider how people might view it. The first two games are so unengaging that the stocky Yugoslav feels he has to spice things up. I don't know how fit he is, but he certainly looks to have talent. The audience wants to be entertained, right? More to the point, Karakasevic wants to be entertained? So after winning the first two games easily, and seeing no prospects of a fight in the early 3rd, he begins exhibition play. O.K., he might think, to an experienced eye, maybe this smacks of arrogance, and maybe in context it is demeaning. But how many experienced eyes are there here? And, really, how seriously can I take this match, this tie, this tournament? In Europe it would be different, I wouldn't do it - but of course I'd have better competition in Europe. Yaniv is pleasantly into this boyish exhibition. He's become Karakasevic's equal - they play, joke, in tandem. On up, up, up, goes the score until the game is finally won by Sharon. This is fun, he thinks. The exhibition play has given him practice, loosened him, and the won game has given him confidence. "Let's continue playing this way," he says he says to Karakasevic. The Yugoslav is not so sure. He doesn't consent to that - maybe serious is better? Of course he hasn't been too serious - he hasn't had to be. Does he have to be now? Certainly he isn't focused to play seriously. Yaniv seems to be taking his cue from Karakasevic who seems not to have a clue as to definitive action. Like one of their high lobs, the match seems up in the air. The audience is suspended too, for Yanev, playing better and better, wins the 4th. It's now apparent that we're watching, or have been watching, the anomaly, the paradox, of a "competitive exhibition." In the 5th, Yaniv is playing to win - and Karakasevic is tightening, outside and inside? Especially now as the Israeli corner, particularly in the person of Idan, begins cheering point after point for Sharon. Is that sporting? Well, maybe not - but it's giving everyone a buzz. This match is no longer fun for Karakasevic. He's no longer thinking about pleasing the spectators. Down 10-8, he's thinking about pleasing himself. Which means stopping the game to go over and protest Idan's partisanship. After all, does Levi or anyone else really think there's a life-and-death struggle going on here? In fact, Karakasevic doesn't know it, but one observer had been struck by the good fellowship between this Israeli, this Yugoslav - how they sported with themselves, bumped into an embrace, enjoyed the freedom-feel of play. What happened? Of course the match wasn't really any big deal - Karakasevic wasn't irritated enough to do anything stupid, so Killerspin wasn't going to lose him or the tie. But Yaniv wins the match. Quarterfinals Quarter's Draw: #1 seed Canada 1's on top-top; #2 Killerspin's at bottom-bottom. #3 Seattle and #4 Texas Wesleyan are flipped - Seattle into top semi's position, Wesleyan into bottom semi's position. KS4's already played Canada, so it's flipped into bottom half against...Wesleyan. Pioneers has already played Killerspin, so it's flipped into top half against...Seattle. Canada 2's already played Seattle, so it goes to the remaining bottom position against Killerspin; Table Tennis About has already played Wesleyan, so it goes to the remaining top position against Canada 1. Yuh follow, I presume - but, alas, you won't be too pleased with the one-sided results. Canada 1 blanked Table Tennis About. Every time I saw Sean Lonergan he seemed to be forcing himself into some mild form of that which he insists he doesn't practice - yoga. But talk about a stretch. Canadian National Coach Dejan Papic had his charges half hidden behind the bleachers going through all sorts of back-bending contractions. But since Papic himself was on crutches, maybe Lonergan knew what he was about. Anyway, there was a certain symmetry to TTA's best efforts - all lost deuce in the 4th, with Lonergan, stretching, stretching, losing the 3rd to Csaba, 18-16, as well. Seattle gave up just one match to the ambitiously, not to say immodestly, named Pioneers World Team. No match went 5 games in this tie either; Yaniv beat Cheng 3-zip. Killerspin 5 - Canada 2. Er, make that Killerspin 5-0 over Canada 2. Just before this tie gets underway, Lupulesku, who, in addition to being 4-time Yugoslav National Champion with estimable World, Olympic, and European Doubles successes to his credit, is warming up with Erlandsen. As Lupi is moving increasingly left, exchanging curl-around loops, his racket suddenly goes flying from his hand maybe 20 feet out in front of him. What the...Turns out an umpire has come across behind him and, intent on tidily straightening out some slightly uneven side barriers, is apparently oblivious to the players in the court - to the professionals and their wide-ranging abilities. Lupi's caught him on his swing through. The umpire goes on by as if, in his desire to do his job properly, he's still unaware he's been in Lupi's way. Lupi gives him a look, picks up his racket, brings it back to the table, inspects it minutely, pronounces it O.K. And if it weren't? Lefty Erlandsen, World #79, is extended 11-9 in the 4th by Hinse. But, ah, we are going to have a 5-gamer. Lupi's 1-1 with Therien when the Canadian from 7-all scores on two serve follow-ups, the second bringing him down on one knee - and goes on to take a 2-1 lead. Lupi, in his 30's now, looks a little slow...but he dominates 11-3 in the 5th. The one contested quarter's tie is won 5-4 by Texas Wesleyan over Chicago Killerspin 4. In the start-off match, Wesleyan's Wang, down 2-1 and 10-9 in the 4th to Ashu Jain, takes the forehand he should, but misses. Later, David will lose 11-9 in the 4th to Drinic. But still later, with his team down 4-3, he'll win the match they need against Shiu. Owens, 2001 U.S. Singles and Doubles Champ (shouldn't someone be sponsoring lettering or logo on his distinctive headband?) opens with a win over Shiu. Then against Ashu he's 1-1 and down 10-7 in the 3rd, 10-8, then...a gutsy serve and smacko, followed by another - and he's deuced it. But Ashu gets the ad, and an edge to win it. After which Eric loses the 4th , 11-9, by swatting one off. Putting a good face on his loss, he comes off the table smiling. Eric's last match is against Sasa, and, down 2-0 and at 9-9, he can't win that either. But this time he's not smiling - off court his racket thumps against the concrete. Meanwhile, Butler against his opening opponent, Sasa, is 1-1 and 9-all, at which point he gets a very welcome net. Sasa slaps the dumb ball, sends it flying. But it comes snapping back via a Butler backhand. Jimmy goes on to win in 4. Then wins in 4 again from Shiu. With the tie 4-4, Butler holds three-straight steady against Jain - though there is an abrupt moment of stimulation when Ashu makes a wondrous shot around the net that catches the table edge and bounces up to the rising ohhhs of the crowd. Semifinals   There's a different format for the semi's. Best of 5 matches, not best of 9; 4 games to win, not 3; and one of the three team players will play only the 3rd match of the tie. But now not only were the ties uncontested but so were almost all the matches. Seattle beat Canada 1, 3-0. U.S. #1-rated Fan 5, 2, 8, 4 downed Kassam, 4-0. Cheng - surviving a 12-10 1st game with Cabrera to take advantage of the Canadian's lack of confidence, his helplessness really - jumped to 10-2, 10-4 leads in the 2nd and 3rd games. Yes, Cabrera came back to win the 4th, but that seemed freakish, for Cheng, again clearly outplaying him, hurried to another 10-2 lead in the 5th.  Fortunately for the spectators, a great many of whom had to stand because there weren't enough bleacher seats to accommodate them, our 4-time National Champion David Zhuang played a 5-4 bang-up match with young Csaba. Up 10-8 in the 1st, David's no lock - Bence draws to 10-9. Whereupon David, with a high toss, tosses away the point - serves off. Then is ad down; fortune's fool, he's lost 4 in a row. But he really does know how to serve when he has to, and proves it with a fearless follow. From 12-all he finishes with two compact winners. Up 10-8 in the 2nd, you know he wins the next point because there's Bence flipping his racket tableward. His aim isn't good - it teeters, falls...Csaba himself, however, does not go down. He rallies - takes the next two games. Match all even. And all even after two more. At 4-all in the 5th, Bence makes a great lob get and then, seemingly fastened to the floor, makes a 20-feet-back-from-the-table side-swipe chop at the ball - the most refreshing shot of the match - that just misses catching the table. As David increases his lead, yells as he goes up 8-5, the crowd for the first time implies he's their favorite. When his next ball nicks the edge and he goes over and kisses where it hit, he's definitely their man.  The Killerspinners will of course join Seattle in the final - just as soon as they unjoin Wesleyan. Butler wins the 1st from Karakasvic, and in the 2nd, after the Yugoslav catapults in two of his much admired backhands, Butler snaps in his own backhand winner in defiance. Unfortunately for him it's just one of two points he gets this game. Game Butler is, but Karakasevic is too good - finishes off Jimmy with a mighty swing. Huang and Owens...what can I say? That Eric's pretty consistent - loses the 1st, 3rd, and 4th at 6, 5, 5. Only in the 2nd game is he deviant - down 9-0, he scores, and raises his hands in mock triumph. Always good to keep one's sense of humor, eh? Erlandsen vs. Wang, 2, 5, 6, 2, I'll stick in here. Final How many matches will this final tie go? Three. How many games will be won by those about to be killed in play? Three. Fan, leading off against Karakasevic, looks ready. Is up 7-3 and running down the ball. His backhand loops bound in, rivaling his opponents'. Someone speaks of how he cleverly mixes the spin on his blocks. He wins the 1st at 7. Early in the 2nd, however, he's in discomfort, keeps wiggling his neck. He gets behind, more or less gives up. After Karakasevic bullets two fast serves by Fan's immobile forehand to win this game 11-3, Fan comes back to his corner where Zhuang looks to be lightly rubbing ointment to his neck. What's happening?  Fan loses the next game at 4. As they prepare to start the 4th, the umpire doesn't realize the game scores on his scoreboard are reversed. Spectators welcome the divertissement, help him out. Fan isn't finished...yet. Up 4-0, 6-2, he fends off Karakasevic's protest about something - that Fan's returned the ball off his shirt? One is privy to so little. Errors now from Fan. Twice on missing, he spins around, provides ballet-drama...eventually loses 11-8. In the 5th he gets to 9 before Karakasevic signatures by one last caroming, bravura backhand. Huang's prepared for his match with Zhuang by a last-minute warm-up with Lily Yip. A penholder attacker, moving the ball here, there, she gives him good touch. No wonder she's a coach, a practice partner for so many - it'd be good for anybody to warm up with Lily. Against Johnny, David is 6-all-in-the-1st holding his own. It's a battle of fast-hit forehand exchanges, fast picks. But then - how account for it? - Johnny wins 19 points to David's 3. That is, Huang is up 2-0 and 3-0 in the 3rd. But, up 10-8, he does not win this game. There's brutal firepower from both players at this point, but David stands tall. After almost mis-serving he wins the 3rd, 12-10. In the 4th, however, he falls 7-1 behind. Still, regardless of the score, the two have flashy forehand counters that the spectators enjoy. Up 3-1 in games, Johnny's again off to a fast 3-0 start, and from 5-all streaks to an 11-6 win. In the last match of the tournament, Erlandsen, coached for 9 years by Norway's National Coach Jochen Leiss, former German National Champion and the 1977 U.S. Open winner, meets Cheng Yinghua, himself a 2-time U.S. Open, 3-time Nationals winner and of course a much sought after U.S. Coach. Indeed, Cheng's so booked he's no time for practice. Still, he almost wins the 1st from Erlandsen who, down 10-9 gets a cramped forehand in, then despite Cheng's famous basilisk-like look, goes on to take the game 12-10. In the 2nd, Erlandsen's back-from-the-table returns give the illusion of an exhibition, but nobody doubts it's for real: Erlandsen 11-Cheng 4. In the 3rd Cheng, attacking right and left, his confidence rising, continues having trouble getting through Erlandsen's topspin defense, but the points are longer, and Cheng is scoring. He has two ads, but can't convert. At 13-all, he tries to keep the ball short, but Erlandsen pulverizes it, then adds a clincher. Cheng's persistence pays off. At 9-all in the 4th, he makes a perfectly anticipated block return that rebounds in for a point-winner, then gets Erlandsen to pop up his serve return. The match, the tie, continues. As the 5th game progresses, Cheng, as is his habit, gives his racket a little shake, then sends off one serve or another Erlandsen has trouble reading. But Erlandsen's serves work to his advantage too. And his youth. And his constant competitive play. So, good try by Cheng, but 11-9 game, match, tie to Killerspin. "I'd like to have seen more matches like this last one," says a fellow on the way out before the Trophy Presentation. Says another, "I wish someone would train players to play so it'd all be more interesting to the spectators." Wow, the very life of the Sport itself has got to be a struggle, huh? Category Winners Women    Chicas Junior Boy Canada 1 Junior Girls      USATT Junior Girls Over 40s      New York TTC Team 2 College      TX Wesleyan University Division Results Division      Champion      Finalist      Tie Score 1      Chicago Killerspin      Seattle Juic TTC      3-0 2      We Fight Like Cats and Dogs      Chicago Loop, The      5-2 3      Palo Alto      Emerald Boys      5-3 4      New York TTC Team 4      White and Red, The      5-2 5      Champlain      Brighton Beach      5-4 6      Scarborough Kings 3      Minnesota GO 4's      5-2 7      Canadian Chinese 1      Real Talent, Real Close      5-4 8      B-Town Spin      Edgemasters      5-2 9      Malev      Canadian Chinese 2      5-2 10      Richmond Senors      Atlanta Mafia      5-0 11      Puerto Rico 4      The Four Chops      5-3 12     JVD Challenger 2002     Hammer of Thor, The     5-2 Team Names at the Teams By Larry Hodges Each year brings the annual conundrum: what should we call our Team at the Teams this year? Many, of course, go for geographical names, or other straightforward ones. Others turn it into a creative outlet. (To find out who played on each of these teams, go to www.natabletennis.com.) This year there were the usual returning teams: "The Boo's Brothers," "The Hammer of Thor," and the various Don Iguana teams ("Don Iguana Lab Lizards," "Don Iguana Select"). (Missing in Action: Pong Gods.) There were the obligatory "Ring" series names: "Lord of the Ping," "The Fellowship," and "The Baggins." Sadly, there were no Harry Potter names, and only "The Four Jedis" from Star Wars. Some of the more interesting ones:     *"The Oranges of Space Seeds" (Think Charles Darwin.)     *"Quod Licet Jovi, Non Licet Bovi" (Latin for "What is allowed or permitted The Gods is not permitted the cattle.")     *"Team O'Boll" (Who's the #1 European right now?)     *"Off the Hee-Zee "Fo" Shee-zee" (I have no idea!)     *"Jan's Olive" (The most obscure of all. In 1989 - when I was not the editor - a photo of Jan-Ove Waldner ran in USATT's magazine, but it was labeled "Jan Olov Waldner." So this team made photo copies of the photo and caption from 13 years ago, put them on little trays, put olives with toothpicks in them on the tray, and offered them to opposing teams and editors.) And a few others that struck my fancy: "George Foreman Grill" (not a sponsored team), "The Atlanta Bob-Fathers," "The Bubble Geese," "Canton Crunch," "Polish White Eagle," "Stylish Whiff," "Sparkling Ponies," and "Team Who" and "Who."

Last Updated ( Wednesday, 05 January 2005 )

 

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