Butler Advances to Semifinals in Table Tennis

Eighth-seeded Jim Butler advanced to the semifinals of the men’s singles competition in the U.S. Open Table Tennis Championships Saturday at the Anaheim Convention Center.

Butler, of Iowa City, Iowa, defeated unseeded Hee Chan Kang of Korea, 21-17, 21-19, 18-21, 18-21, 21-19, in the best-of-five quarterfinal.

In other quarterfinal action, top-seeded Guoliang Liu of China defeated David Zhuang of East Brunswick, N.J., 21-9, 21-17, 21-14, and will face Butler in a semifinal at 1 p.m. today.

Sixth-seeded Peng Lung Chiang of Taipei will face Zhe Feng of China in the other semifinal at 2 p.m.

Chiang defeated Cheng Yinghua of Gaithersburg, Md., 21-16, 17-21, 21-18, 13-21, 24-22, and Feng advanced with a 21-11, 21-9, 21-12 victory over ninth-seeded Zoltan Varga of Hungary.

In the women’s competition, top-seeded Lijuan Geng of Canada advanced to the finals with a 21-14, 21-12, 16-21, 21-15 victory over seventh-seeded Mirjam Hooman from the Netherlands. Geng advanced to the semifinals with a 21-8, 21-12, 21-10 victory over Wenling Tan of China, and Hooman rallied from a two-game deficit to defeat Chui Tan Chen of China, 16-21, 19-21, 21-10, 21-17, 21-17, in the quarterfinals.

Second-seeded Bettine Vriesekoop of the Netherlands won the other semifinal with a 21-14, 18-21, 21-17, 21-13 victory over 11th-seeded Rika Matsuoka from Japan.

Vriesekoop advanced to the semifinals with an 11-21, 21-15, 23-21, 21-16 victory over sixth-seeded Boon Sik Kim of Korea, and Matsuoka defeated 12th-seeded Lily Yip of Metuchen, N.J., 21-13, 22-24, 21-10, 21-14, in the quarterfinals.