Every point is a match.
That's the piece of advice I've been giving players in tournaments a lot this year. Most competitive matches are won by just a few points. Give away two points a game, and half the games you would have won in a competitive match are lost. Give away even one point a game, and you lose all those deuce games you won, and half those 11-9 games you won. So treasure every point. Stop before serving and receiving and make sure you really are ready. If serving, think tactically about what's the best serve to use. If receiving, consider how you can mess up the opponent with your receive. If you play like every point is a match, you'll win a lot of matches.
Easterns
From a purely won-loss perspective, it wasn't the most successful tournament I've coached at. Players I coached this past weekend at the Eastern Open in New Jersey developed a nasty tendency to not play well, and for some reason there's a correlation between not playing well and not winning. Three times players I coached were at 9-all in the fifth, and all three times they lost 11-9. (That's the stuff that makes nightmares.) But many Marylanders did well.
Nine-year-old Crystal Wang, rated 2009, upset players rated 2321, 2182, 2145, and 2038, winning Under 22 Women and making the semifinals of Under 2250. Ten-year-old Derek Nie, rated 1866, upset players rated 2202, 2083, and 2022, making the semifinals of Under 16 Boys (as did his brother, George, with both losing in the opposite sides in the semis). Xiyao "Pamela" Song won Under 18 Girls and was second in Under 22 Women. And let's not forget Jeff Smart, the Over 50 winner! (He attended the recent ITTF Coaching Seminar I ran at MDTTC - see how much he learned?) And of course Xun "Jeffrey" Zeng won the Open! So Maryland brought home a few titles.