While we wait for Sam Steiner’s official tournament update to be posted at the Erie Table Tennis Club website, the major news from the tournament was the record setting 160 players who were kind enough to attend the tournament and the attendance of 7 top 100 U.S. men in this event.

In order of current ranking we had:

U.S. #18 Dan Seemiller at 2557
U.S. #19 Barney J Reed at 2554
U.S. #32 Samson Dubina at 2504
U.S. #40 Yahao Zhang at 2456
U.S. #57 Joseph Cochran at 2423
U.S. #58 Randy Seemiller at 2420
U.S. #94 Marcus Jackson at 2349

Dan Seemiller’s Erie dominance was put on at least a temporary hold as he fell to both Barney and Samson in the Open finals, setting up the championship match between the second and third seeds.

In the final match, Reed was simply too much for Dubina too handle, sweeping the best of 7 championship 4-0.

As a player and fan, it was great to see the record turnout(especially considering the financial crunch many in the country are under).  IMHO, Sam always makes his tournaments worth the money spent to attend.

Sincere thanks go to the front desk crew of Sam Steiner, Miklos Balogh, Ron Arcaro, et al for making this jam packed tournament run as close to on time as conditions permitted.

And a special thanks to Sam’s wife Claire and family for their generous hospitality every October during the Saturday night player party they hold at their home.  They go out of their way to make this a great experience.

Don’t forget to check the Erie Table Tennis site over the next week or so for the official tournament summary.  It will be posted once Sam has recovered from running himself ragged for us.