The NOVA Cherry Blossom tournament was held on Saturday, April 9, at the George Mason University Law School in Arlington VA. Fifty-seven players participated, including Andy Liu, 1P, Michael Chen, 7D, and Xinying Jiang, 7D. Four members of the Han family also participated: father, Tongwei Han, and children, Tienfeixue, Xueqi, and Luyao. Unusual results included twenty-one people tied for either first or second place trophies. "IOU's were given after the trophies ran out!" reports TD Allan Abramson.
The winners were:
First place: Zhaonian Chen, 7D, (4-0); Victor Kang, 3D, (3-1); Quinn Baranoski, 1D, and Jacob Lewellen, 1K, (tied at 3-1); Joey Phoon, 3K, (4-0); Neel Brown, 6K, and Tevis Tsai, 6K, (tied at 4-0); Chris Harzer, 12K, (4-0); Andy Crump, 15K, Matthew Marks, 16K, and Amber Boyden, 19K (tied at 3-1); and Tianfeixue Han, 28K, (2-2)
Second place: Andy Liu, 1P, (3-1); Kabe Chin, 2D, Frederick Bao, 2D, and Tongwei Han, 2D, (all tied at 2-2); Nathan Epstein, 1D, and Zongying Qiu, 2K, (tied at 2-2); John Gibson, 5K, Chris Johnson, 5K, and Caleb Vickers, 5K, (all tied at 2-2); Michael Lash, 6K, and Anderson Barreal, 8K, (tied at 3-1); Luke Schafer, 10K and Ning-Yuan Wang, 12K, (tied at 3-1); and Erik Fagerstrom, 25K, and Luyao Han, 28K (tied at 2-2)