(by Steve Hopkins)

Action started on Friday in San Juan at the 2024 Butterfly Puerto Rico Open Teams.  This morning, the top 8 teams faced off in the Quarterfinals.  Team 888 TTC topped Mile High TT Academy 3-0.  Yubeen Han defeated Chance Friend, Nandan Naresh defeated Vinay Chandra, and Tyrese Knight defeated Pablo Figueroa as 888 TTC blanked Mile High to advance.

Sweden Team and Universal battled to the last match as Sweden Team eked out a narrow victory.  The loss of Universal means that the sole remaining defending Champion (Angel Naranjo who was a part a different winning squad a year ago)  is now eliminated.   Naranjo was the main highlight of his team today, as he logged wins over Daniel Lindso and Charlie Carlsson.  However, Team Sweden won the other three matches, with Axel Torres Torres and Juan Jesus Gomez Carbajal falling to Charlie Carlsson, Elliot Lundqvist, and Daniel Lindso.

Puerto Rico Team advanced this morning with a 3-1 win over Overrated Scrubs.  It was Jabdiel Torres over William Feng, Gabriel Perez over Albert Yang, and Jabdiel Torres over Charles Shen for the three points.  The sole point for the Scrubs was Charles Shen’s 3-2 win over Steven Moreno.  LYTTC Hitters took out Cooperativa Naguabena 2 in the last Quarterfinal.  Issac Vila logged two wins, and Kaden Xu scored the other point as LYTTC won 3-1.  Naguabena’s Jerall Montijo defeated Dean Shu in the other match – the lone point for their team.

Sweden Team is now scheduled to face 888 TTC and Puerto Rico Team is scheduled to face LYTTC Hitters in their respective Semifinal matchups.  The champions will take home $7,000 and the runner-ups will receive $3,000.  The winners will stand at the top of over 300 athletes who had been vying for those prizes – with players from Puerto Rico, the US, France, Canada, Mexico, Peru, Colombia, Brazil, and Sweden.

Puerto Rico Open Links:  Photos on Flickr   |  Live Scoring on StadiumTT   |   Live Stream (during the event) |  PR Open Articles

Visit ButterflyOnline.com for the latest table tennis news and results.