After finishing third in boys badminton doubles in the Central Coast Section, freshman Joshua Yuan and junior Albert Liu continued on to place fifth in the NorCal Championships in San Jose on May 19.
Taking the first steps into these championships began by winning the Peninsula Athletic League tournament, thus qualifying for CCS, where Yuan and Liu faced a much higher level of competition.
“The players there were definitely all very skillful,” Yuan said. “[CCS] was definitely harder than PAL.”
After winning third place in CCS, the duo moved on to the NorCal championships, where they faced some of the nation’s top-ranked junior badminton players.
“I recognized a lot of people,” Yuan said. “A lot of them also play junior competitions like me, [where] we played in the same competition … There were some that are also top players in the nation as well.”
Some of their competition turned out to be teammates of Yuan as well.
“There are [also] some that play in my club,” Yuan said.
After competing with players of their own skill, Yuan and Liu took home fifth place, as well as making the All-PAL team for the Bay Division.
