Morozumi into Hokkaido Bank Classic Final

Japan's Yusuke Morozumi (Photo: HBCC) won 10-1 over Hayato Sato in Saturday's semifinals. As we saw in Canada over the summer, Japan's men's teams went through a big shuffle as well, with their top ranked team splitting and players going several directions. For Morozumi, this meant Yuta Matsumura became available and for the young shooter who's family hails from the Karuizawa area, it was a perfect match for Morozumi with his brother Kosuke at lead and Ryotaro Shukuya at second. Morozumi represented Japan at the 2018 Winter Olympics in Korea, which Matsumura seemed destined to do after his breakthrough in reaching the Grand Slams in Canada, but fell short in qualifying for the World Championships, then again at Olympic qualifiers, where they surprisingly missed qualifying. This led to Matsumura returning to his roots, joining Morozumi for their first event together, and a solid result to start. In their opening game, Morozumi dropped Consadole, now skipped by Shinya Abe 5-2, a win for Matsumura against his former teammates. Morozumi split their remaining round-robin games, winning 7-3 over Kohsuke Hirata and then losing their last match to Korean champions ByeongJin Jeong 5-4. Sunday's Final will feature a rematch against Jeong as both teams from Pool A will battle for the title.