SiVY Bridge Players Are Making Their Mark

by Lynn Johannesen

SiVY Bridge was founded with the goal of reaching and teaching the next generation of young bridge players. The recent record of current and former SiVY participants suggests that the effort has been successful.

L-R - Rory Xiao, member of the D21 Flight B GNT winning team, Michael Hu and Arthur Zhou, members of the team which placed second. All will be traveling to Las Vegas to represent the District in the GNT Finals. Michael and Arthur also won Flight B North American Pairs and will be traveling to Memphis to play in that final.

For example, Michael Hu and Arthur Zhou recently won the District 21 Flight B North American Pairs (NAP). They were rewarded not only with glory and masterpoints, but with a trip to Memphis to play in the national NAP finals.

Earlier this year, Michael and Arthur also played on the team that finished second in the District 21 Flight B Grand National Teams (GNT). They placed second to a team that included Rory Xiao (playing with his dad). Because the district has a large number of entries, all three SiVY Bridge players will be representing District 21 in the GNT finals in Las Vegas this July.

Many players look eagerly for their names on the McKenney Top 500, a list of the players scoring the largest number of masterpoints in a given year. But the ACBL also publishes results for the Mini- McKenney, which tracks masterpoint achievements by ranking for players who started the year at lower masterpoint totals. SiVY Bridge players were among the leaders in District 21 in several of those categories in 2018.

In our District, Michael Xu ranked number 3 in the 5-20 masterpoint category. Stella Wan ranked first in the 50-100 point category.

SiVY Bridge players dominated the top spots in the 300-500 category for District 21. Daniel Sonner finished first, Sarah Youngquist finished second, Brent Xiao finished third, and Cornelius Duffie finished 6th.

None of the younger SiVY Bridge participants scored well in higher Mini-McKenney categories. But Kevin Rosenberg, who not only played in SiVY events but also mentored many of the younger players, is number 3 in the 1500-2500 masterpoint category in the District.

Many SiVY Bridge players have had high finishes in both regional and sectional competitions this year, including a win at a regional pair game for Brent Xiao and a win at a sectional Flight A Swiss team for Daniel Sonner and Sarah Youngquist. Their fine early showing indicates that SiVY will have even better results in the 2019 Mini-McKenney races.

SiVY Bridge
2018 Mini-McKenney Hall of Fame