(by Steve Hopkins)
As the smoke settled in Ontario, California – it was the top two seeds that advanced to the Final in both Men’s and Women’s Singles. In the Women’s Singles Event, there was a small upset as Amy Wang topped Lily Zhang in the All-American Final. In the Men’s Singles Event, Ukraine’s Lei Kou defeated Californian Zhou Xin.
In the Men’s event, the top seed only trailed one time in the tournament – down 1-2 to Daniel Gorak in their Quarterfinal. Even in the Gorak match, however, Lei rallied to win 4-2. He was pressed again in his Semifinal match against Ma Jinbao, but again won 4-2. In the Final, despite close game scores, Lei won 4-0. For Zhou, he needed all seven games to fight past Nikhil Kumar in the Quarterfinals, and was down early to Wei Wang before fighting back in the Semifinals for a 4-2 win before falling in the Final.
Amy Wang continued her great December with a US Open win. Earlier this month, she faced Lily Zhang in the Final of the WTT Feeder event in Fort Lauderdale and came out on top. Yesterday, she repeated that performance at the US Open – scoring the small upset with a tough-fought 4-3 win over Lily.
Men’s Doubles went to Lei Kou and Ye Tian. Women’s Doubles went to Lily Zhan and Rachel Sung. The Mixed Doubles title went to Nikhil Kumar and Amy Wang. Puerto Rico’s Angel Naranjo claimed the U21 title and Puerto Rico’s Jabdiel Torres won U19 Boys. Rachel Sung won U21 Women and Youruo Wu won U19 Girls.
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