The Diamond Bar High School badminton team earned their fourth consecutive CIF title after defeating Long Beach Polytechnic High School 16–5 on May 9. The win wrapped up the team’s undefeated season.

The badminton team participated in the title match for their sixth consecutive year. The team played two close matches against Wilson and Loma Linda, however, the team prevailed and moved on to the final match.

“It felt very good. The team played very well. We got off to a huge lead and I didn’t think we’d get out to such a wide margin so early but they all played so well that it became academic they were going to win the match,” head coach Kemp Wells said.

According to Wells, seniors Tim Chui and Jonah Perea, sophomores Vincent Chui and Justin Lam are four of this year’s top boys on the team while, seniors Ivorine Do and Claire Chen, sophomores Megan Tsui and Gwen Wang, and freshman Jasmine Huang led the girl’s side.

“It leaves a very satisfying sense of accomplishment. To know that our team has not lost one game in four years is just amazing,” senior varsity captain Tim Chui said via Facebook.

Chui credits the team’s success to the amount of training members have put in. Several team members including Justin Lam and Megan Tsui are part of the Global Badminton Academy in Pomona, which helps them with training outside of school practice.

While they are not part of a league due to lack of surrounding schools with badminton teams, the Brahmas continue to work hard and strive to advance with its undefeated streak. But the team played far fewer games because it isn’t in a league.

“It [not being in a league] gave us far fewer games this year, which kind of hurts because we have such a large team I would like to rotate people in matches and try to use very single person we have if possible,” the coach said. “I haven’t had an opportunity to put some players in as many games as I would normally like to. It also restricts us from not having league finals.”

Getting into a league will be a one of Wells’ main priorities next year.  Continuing to reinforce what they have been doing for the past few years will help with strengthening the team as well.

“Only one team has done that more than five times. It would be nice to eclipse that six straight championships won by Villa Park,” Wells said.

Several team members also participated in the CIF individuals on May 14 and 15.  Freshman Jasmine Huang and Sophomore Gwen Wang placed second in women’s doubles. Sophomore Vincent Chiu and Freshman Ambrose So placed first in men’s doubles while Senior Tim Chiu and Sophomore Justin Lam placed second. Vincent and Wang took first place for mixed doubles and So and Huang placed second.