Lee to challenge men’s field in PIC tennis

 Former junior player Vivian Lee will be playing in the men’s open singles division of the 12th Annual PIC Tennis Championships this weekend at the PIC hard court.

Lee, who took the women’s singles doubles last week, teaming up with Thea Minor, will start her campaign in the men’s field against 2010 Micronesian Games medalist Bobby Cruz tonight at 7pm.

Other first round matches today are Tim Quan versus Dong Min Lee and Rafael Jones against Russell Buenaventura. Todd Montgomery completes the men’s field and drew a bye in the first second. The winner of the Jones-Buenaventura tiff will face Montgomery in the semifinals tomorrow, while victors of the Cruz-Vivian Lee and Quan-Dong Min Lee games will duel in the other semis match.

In the men’s 4.0 singles, five players will fight for the championship. Colin Ramsey challenges father, Gary, in the first round tonight, with the winner colliding against Chang Whan Jang tomorrow. Also scheduled to meet this Saturday are junior players Carl Dela Cruz and Chris Cajigan.

The men’s 3.0 singles will be a battle among PIC employees with Darrel Roligat facing Glenn Policare and Dennis Tababa squaring off against Keoni Ichihara.

In the women’s open, Mikayla Lopez will be up against the favored Thea Minor this Saturday, while Malika Miyawaki and Kinumi Taniguchi will duel for the women’s 3.0 title also on Saturday.

Besides the adults singles, the second and final week of the PIC tournament will also feature junior doubles and mixed doubles games.

Four pairs are playing in the mixed open with Cruz and Thea Minor on the upper half of the bracket, joining Roy Pangelinan and Jodel Fernandez. Quan and teammate Lopez are in the lower half with Christian Miller and Vivian Lee.

The mixed 3.0 singles also has four teams in Isabel Heras and Luther Lizama, husband and wife Aaron and Nina Engelhardt, Dylan Ackerman and Carol Lee, and mother and son Flor and Michael Jones.

In the junior girls U12 doubles, only three teams are entered: Julia Ishikawa and Tania Tan; sisters Liza and Catherine Atalig, and Grace Choi and Malika Miyawaki. In the boys division, Ken Song and Tony Kim will face Michael Jones and Steven Goodwin, while Haruya Eda and Vincent Tudela will take on Clayton Izuka and Alex Park.