Garden Grove Upsets Villa Park for Title

Garden Grove thought it was in trouble after the first round of the Southern Section badminton final Tuesday at the Orange County Badminton Club. After losing two of three mixed-doubles sets, the Argonauts needed a minor miracle to upset top-seeded Villa Park.

Enter Garden Grove’s Cynthia Tran, who almost single-handedly gave Garden Grove (18-1) the title with a 10-9 victory over top-seeded Villa Park.

The match came down to the final set in boys’ doubles. But, it was Tran, who won the crucial games to turn the match around. Tran, a senior, who played doubles all during the regular season, played singles during the playoffs.

Against Villa Park (18-1) she pulled off the two biggest victories of her career, upsetting Amy Nguy and Bonnie Wong, two junior national players training for the 2004 Olympics. Tran’s two victories were the only losses by the Villa Park girls all season.

“I knew I could win,” said Tran, The Times Orange County player of the year in 1998. “I’ve always been taught to never give up.”

In her first match against Wong, Tran won the first game, 11-8, but faltered in the second, falling, 11-1. Tran trailed, 6-2, in the third game, when the two girls switched sides and Tran found inspiration in her team. She rallied to win, 11-9.

“When we switched sides and I saw all my teammates, I said to myself, ‘I have to do this,’ ” Tran said.

After her first victory, Tran still had to face Nguy, the Southern Section’s individual champion. It was a match few gave Tran a chance of winning. But again she proved skeptics wrong, quickly putting away Nguy, 11-8, 11-6, and giving her team a one-point lead.

With the team score tied, 9-9, the boys’ doubles match between Garden Grove’s Michael Tran and Scott Lee and Villa Park’s Neilson Ku and Nao Teshima decided the championship.

Tran and Lee won the first set, 15-8, and looked to be on the way to the title, but Ku and Teshima rallied to win the next game, 15-12. In the final game, after a number of service errors, Ku and Teshima folded and Tran and Lee won, 15-8, giving Garden Grove its second title in five years.

“I felt down after we lost in mixed doubles,” Tam Nguyen of Garden Grove said. “But our coach walked up and told us it wasn’t over. So we held on and took every point that mattered. This is unbelievable. I finally get a patch for my varsity jacket.”