Brenda Nguyen, a student at RCTC and member of both the Rochester Table Tennis Club and the RCTC Table Tennis Club, won the Women’s Singles title at the 2011 Minnesota State Table Tennis Championships.
The two-day event was sponsored by the RTTC and RCTC TTC, and held at the UCR Sports Complex. It was the Rochester Club’s first hosting of this prestigious event. Nearly a hundred participants from Minnesota, Wisconsin and South Dakota contested round-robin preliminaries in 17 divisions, with the top players in each division advancing to a single-elimination championship round.
Nguyen’s thrilling win looked possible after she knocked off top-rated Ksenia Olson, last year’s champion and tourney favorite, but a loss in the preliminary round to Sandhya Joshi forced Nguyen into a second matchup with Joshi to decide the championship. The initial contest between the two was easily won by Joshi, with Nguyen struggling against her opponent’s quick but nearly spinless backhand.
In the best-of-five championship match, the players alternated wins with Joshi leading the way. Nguyen, who thrives on her opponents’ attack and power, had to play more carefully than she is accustomed, serving short and developing her points rather than winning them with her usual rapid-fire counter-blocking.
The strategy kept her close, and late in the fifth and deciding game Nguyen caught fire. She pushed the score to 9-5, two points short of the championship. Joshi called a time out to slow her opponent’s momentum, and made her way back to 9-9. But there was no stopping Nguyen, who won the next two points to close out an exciting and unexpected championship drive.
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Other RTTC medal winners include Brenda’s father, Lai Nguyen (who was stopped in the Men’s Open semifinals by five-time Minnesota Open Champion Mitchell Seidenfeld), Norm Hopkins who won the Over-60 Novice Singles event, third-grader Michael Tran winning second place in the Cadet U-14 division, and Chi Lam and Lai Nguyen taking Open Doubles Runners-up honors. Third-place medals were also awarded to club members Chris Lam and Ben Kubesh (High School Singles), Rick Lee (Novice 60+ Singles), Chi Lam and Joel Lidstrom (Classic Hardbat Singles), Chris Lam (U-2800 Doubles), Dave McCarthy (U-1400 Singles), Norm Hopkins (U-1000 Singles), Chi Lam (Masters 40+ Singles), and Michal Tran (U-1800 Singles).
Here are the complete results from the tournament, with RTTC/RCTC TTC members asterisked:
Novice Singles
1. Carson McClarey
2. Jackson Kranz
3. Caleb Aker & Tyler George
High School Singles
1. Henry Klaverkamp
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2. Oliver He
3. *Christopher Lam & *Benjamin Kubesh
Novice 60+ Singles
1. *Norman Hopkins
2. Russ Margulies
3. *Rick Lee & Hong Yuan Lang
Classic Hardbat Singles
1. James Borin
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2. Cory Orescanin
3. *Chi Lam & *Joel Lidstrom
U-2800 Doubles
1. Henry Klaverkamp/Benjamin Huynh
2. Sith Bounkeo/Santhoshkumar Srinivasan
3. Sandhya Joshi/Elliot Fanye & *Christopher Lam/Tim McGrane
U-1400 Singles
1. Santhoshkumar Srinivasan
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2. Elliot Frayne
3. Mukwa Ogitchida & *Dave McCarthy
U-1000 Singles
1. Benjamin Huynh
2. Dustin La Barge
3. Tim Montzka & *Norm Hopkins
Women's Singles
1. *Brenda Nguyen
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2. Sandhya Joshi
3. Ksenia Olson & Ann Elliott
Cadets U-14 Singles
1. David Lee
2. *Michael Minh Tran
3. Benjamin Huynh & Carson McClarey
U-1200 Singles
1. Elliot Frayne
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2. Santhoshkumar Srinivasan
3. Brandon Mader & Mukwa Ogitchida
Open Doubles
1. Cory Eider/Mitchell Seidenfeld
2. *Lai Nguyen/*Chi Lam
3. Chris Sievert/Joe McGrath & Say Lee/Yao Yang
U-1600 Singles
1. Yao Yang
2. Omofuma Akhigbe
3. Quan Ni & Santhoshkumar Srinivasan
Open Singles
1. Cory Eider
2. Mitchell Seidenfeld
3. *Lai Nguyen & Joel Roberts
U-2000 Singles
1. Henry Klaverkamp
2. Say Lee
3. Joe McGrath & David Lee
Juniors U-18 Singles
1. Joe McGrath
2. David Lee
3. Chris Sievert & Henry Klaverkamp
Masters 40+ Singles
1. Trac B. Cao
2. David M. Elliott
3. *Chi Lam & Gaylord Aguila
U-1800 Singles
1. Henry Klaverkamp
2. David Lee
3. *Michael Minh Tran & Vu Nguyen
