Bronze for NMI U17 Badminton Team in New Zealand

The NMI Junior National Badminton program continues to show steady progress and success on the international stage, as the U17 team brought home a bronze medal after the Pacific U17 Invitation Team Challenge 2026 in Auckland, New Zealand on Saturday, Feb. 14.

Lina Tsukagoshi, Eunho Park, Peng Fei Lin, Kate Yi Xu, William Guo, and Evan Seguritan represented the CNMI in the tournament, which began on Feb. 12.

On the final day, after picking up key wins earlier in the tourney, they faced Wallis and Futuna and came away with a 4-1 victory to secure their spot on the podium.

Before that on Friday, the team had to grind it out but pulled off a tight 3-2 win over Tahiti for their second team victory. Seguritan and Tsukagoshi led the way, winning their matches to help seal it. The day before that, NMI fell just short against the Cook Islands, 3-2.

The team opened the tournament and their road to the podium on Thursday with a strong 4-1 win over Guam. Seguritan and Tsukagoshi each won their singles matches, while the women’s doubles team of Eunho Park and Kate Xu followed with a 21-7, 21-16 victory over Yuxi Chen and Yunuo Zhong. Seguritan and Tsukagoshi then teamed up to finish it in mixed doubles, defeating Phillip Noret and Catacutan 21-11, 21-13.

The bronze win continues a strong run for NMI’s junior national program as last year, the U15 team also won bronze at the Pacific U15 Invitational Team Challenge in New Zealand, while the U19 squad claimed bronze at the VICTOR Oceania Junior Mixed Team Championships in Saipan.

For head coach Nate Guerrero, the medal means more than just the result. He said every team has to start somewhere, and he hopes this showing pushes more young athletes to pick up the sport—or any sport, and work toward representing the islands.

Guerrero, along with assistant coaches Janelle Pangilinan and Ezekiel Macario, expected a tough field. Three of the six teams had returning players from past competitions, so they knew it would come down to effort and execution. As he put it, it was “just going to come down to playing hard and aiming to always find success.”

He said there wasn’t really a single turning point in the tournament. The team made it a priority to take every opponent seriously and keep the same approach each match.

More than anything, Guerrero said he’s proud of how the athletes have grown. From the U15 level up to the open division, he’s watched them develop year after year—and he believes they still have plenty of room to improve.

He also stressed that wearing the national colors comes with responsibility. The goal is always to compete for the podium, he said, because that mindset is what separates national tournaments from local events.

“I think that even a little place like the Northern Marianas has the potential to compete with other countries,” Guerrero said. “As long as you stay focused, stay determined, stay disciplined, stay humble, stay good in school, and listen to your parents and coaches as well, you’ll be able to achieve great things in life.”

An NMI open men’s and women’s team also competed in the concurrent Victor Oceania Open Championships 2026, with the women’s team placing fourth and the men’s team placing sixth.