On Sunday the 12th, UC San Diego Badminton competed against two more schools in an exciting series of home games! UC Los Angeles and Cal State San Bernardino (CSUSB) were able to come to San Diego to compete. Additionally we hosted matches for UC Riverside with both of these schools. The collegiate league was excited to welcome back CSUSB to the league, as they previously had taken some years off. A full day of exciting badminton ensued as many people who had previously met at our preseason tournament got the chance to compete in a league-match style competition.

Against CSUSB, the continued practice of UC San Diego’s team proved to be too strong, as San Diego swept CSUSB in a straight 14-0 match victory without dropping a single game. This was a very empowering start of the day for UC San Diego and helped propel the momentum of the event for the rest of the day! Notably some of UC San Diego’s newer players got the chance to show their talent as Pyae Maung, Seth Lee, and Edmund Lau all played (and won) in their first league matches.

UCLA came to San Diego with a somewhat altered lineup than what was expected.  Several injuries prevented players from coming. Regardless of some of their injured, UCLA fielded a powerful lineup including freshman Jordy Supandi, winner of both men’s singles and men’s doubles in this year’s preseason tournament. San Diego’s matches against UCLA were some of the most contentious of the year thus far, with many matches being played out in split set full games. UCLA beat out San Diego in all three men’s singles games, which San Diego countered with a three match sweep in women’s singles. The rest of the day played out to a score of 5-6 (in UCLA’s favor) before the final matches of the day in mixed doubles and women’s doubles. San Diego’s Martin Hung and Cindy Chan won their mixed doubles match to bring San Diego tied with UCLA. In the final, Dora Trieu and Thu Le finished off their UCLA counterparts for a San Diego victory and final score of 7-6.

With these two victories at hand, this continues UC San Diego’s undefeated streak since the start of the year. Thus far San Diego has defeated, UCB, UCLA, UCR, CSUSB, UCD, and Cal Poly SLO, with only UC Irvine and USC left to play. It was absolutely fantastic hosting the three schools that came to San Diego this weekend, and even more fantastic that UC San Diego’s flawless record remains intact thus far in the season. Special thanks to CSUSB for being able to rejoin our league this year and come out to play against quite a few schools.  Let’s keep winning tritons!