Despite the large number of UCSD players sent to UCLA for the Bruin Open in the past weekend (10-10/11-2009), few made it past the first few round. Amidst the action packed-weekend, some of the most stunning upsets and disappointing losses were observed. Siavash Assar and Jonathan Lin, the top seed in the D-men’s double department, were shown the exit in the first round after 3 arduous games against high-schoolers Tan T. Le and Tung Thanh Tran (19-21, 21-19, 21-17). “I did not play well at all, I lost all my games against weaker players,” said Siavash after his surprising defeats. Transfer student Ronald Sou, the top seed in B-men’s single, fell in the quarter final after receiving a bye in the first round. “He is a very good player but he hadn’t played badminton for the past two years, he needs a couple months to get back where he was, to start winning tournament again,” commented Alan Liu. The last seeded player from UCSD, however, stayed true to the seeding and returned with silver. UCSD graduate student Po-Ting Chen made it to the B-Mix final but lost out to the top seed of the discipline, honoring their second seed position.

Freshmen Hanna and Nina Wang lost out to the first seed in the C-women’s double in the first round. “Our UCLA opponents were late and were supposed to be defaulted but they knew the tournaments organizers pretty well that they were given special treatment. The tournament organizers waited for them instead of disqualifying them. That bothered and affected our mental game,” lamented Hannah Wang after losing in two close 18-21, 19-21 games.

Janvier Wijaya, UCSD graduate and the current coach of UCSD badminton team, was disposed of by Lee Hock Lai with ease in the first round of A-Men’s single. Wijaya made some difficult shots that stunned Lee in the first half of the first game but Lee slowly regain composure and took control of the game, eventually downing Wijaya 21-10, 21-13. As if to make up for his loss in the A flight, Wijaya fought hard and was crowned the B-Men’s single champion after beating Nick Hardi 21-15, 21-19 in the final. Along with his A-Men’s double partner, Sutanto Wibowo, Janvier Wijaya also managed to secure the A-Men’s double Con title after losing to UCSD’s former captain, Victor Liu, in the first round.

Victor Liu managed to drown two UCSD pairs in the A flight, Janvier Wijaya/Sutanto Wibowo and Alan Liu/George Hong in the first round and in the quarter final respectively. Sutanto Wibowo credited his loss to the strangeness of the UCLA gym. They gym was 1.5x bigger than the UCSD main gym and unfortunately, a large space like this creates a more drastic air drifts whenever a door is opened. “The lighting and the drifts threw our games off, I am just not used to the gym. A weaker player can beat a better one in this gym,” commented Wibowo. Alan Liu, however, has a different opinion about what went wrong. “We (UCSD badminton) are so used to slow birds that when we play with fast birds, our tempo and pace are totally off!” said Liu. UCSD badminton currently uses a series of Wilson birds that are relatively slow compared to the high end A-S Yonex birds. “We missed a couple front court kills and our net drops were too high due to the fast speed birds,” added Liu after an agonizing 26-28, 21-9, 21-19 defeat in the quarter final. “That game was so nerve-wreaking! George and Alan were trailing 14-20 in the first game but they miraculously saved 6 game points and eventually took it down 28-26. Both pairs were neck to neck in the third game up till 17-17 but some errors put their opponents to 20-17, they managed to save 2 game points but lost out eventually with a 19. It was a shame and they could have won if it wasn’t for their couple missed kills and net drops that were below par that game. But all in all, it was a very good match to watch,” said Franco, who watched the whole game.

Junior Aggi Bialy and freshmen Nina Wang did well in the B-Women’s double and returned with silver. The eventual champion from Japan was a little too strong for the runner-ups. Freshmen Angela Yee also had a pretty good run with her mix partner finishing as the semi finalist in A-mixed double after losing to the impressive Lee Hock Lai/Priscilla Lun combination. Freshmen Che and Kevin Yang did well in the D-Men’s double by reaching quarter final before losing to the eventually champion in a contest for a spot in the semi final.

In this Bruin Open, some players showed flashes of brilliance while some uncovered the flaws in their game that they need to improve on. This will certainly serve as a confidence boosters and improvements for the players in the upcoming pre-season tournament, where strong teams such as UCLA and UCI will be featured. The pre-season will be held in UCSD on the 18th of October and if you are up for some exciting and high level badminton games, please come down to the main gym on Sunday and cheer for the UCSD badminton team!

Article by: Franco Ooi