There's something about table tennis and British Columbia.

After taking the gold medal in the team event at the Canada Winter Games last week, three Team B.C. players added to their collection of hardware, bringing home gold in their individual events on Friday evening.

They included under-15 female competitor Peggy Hsien, under-15 male competitor Andre Ho and under-18 female player Carmen Lee.

Quebec brought home the gold in the under-18 male event with Ling Yang defeating teammate Bryan Michaud, who took home silver.

'Our preparation for the tournament was very good,' Ho said following his gold medal win. 'We would practise three times a week together, for like three hours a day, and practise our doubles, our mixed doubles and everything together.'

Earlier in the week, the team's head coach, Chandra Madhosingh, said that in addition to the usual training schedule, he was able to bring in two table tennis experts from China to work with the team in preparing for the Games.

As Ho spoke about his own match, small beads of sweat rolled down his face.

In his own match best-of-five games, final match against Quebec's Arnaud Roche-Nadon, 14, the athletes made use of the full court, jumping from side to side.

In the end though, the 15-year-old dominated the match with a 3-1 win. He was defeated in his second game 11-9, but won with scores of 11-9 in the first game and 11-6 in the third and fourth game.

'In the crucial points he missed a few of my serves,' Ho said, noting that whoever got the serve back into the game usually got the point during the games.

The serves and rallies throughout the match were really good, he said.

While Ho brought the gold home to B.C. in his event, the team's Tony Liu, 14, was defeated by Team Manitoba's Tian Zhang, 13, in the bronze medal match, which began the evening of table tennis play.

Spectators decked out in Team 'Toba's' yellow and black gear and plastic noise makers could be heard throughout the bronze medal match along with B.C. fans throughout the matches they played.

'Good job, Andre!' one B.C. fan yelled as Ho scored a point.

With the Canada Winter Games competition at an end, Ho is hopeful he can someday make it to the world championships and on to the Olympics, potentially in 2008.

As Ho's Games experience drew to a close, he said he enjoyed his time and the services at the national competition, though there was one aspect he wasn't so fond of.

'It was good, but I don't like the weather too much because I'm from Vancouver,' he said with a grin.

Walking out with two gold medals in the team and individual events, Hsien had achieved her original goal.

'I just told my coach and my dad I would try my best,' she said.

That effort saw her defeat Quebec's Eloise Garnier-St.-Aubin 3-1, winning her first game by 11-5, and her third and fourth game by 11-4 and 11-8 respectively. She was defeated in the second game by 11- 9.

She concentrated on long shots to defeat the Quebec opponent.

Taking bronze in the under-15 female category was Ontario's Yuri Su with a 3-1 match against Quebec's Roxane Seslauriers.

As the gold medal matches continued, Taiga the Games' Northwest Territories mascot dropped by, greeting officials, coaches and volunteers inside the gym at the Canada Games Centre and waving at spectators sitting on the upper level of the centre.

In the under-18 gold medal female match, Lee beat out Alberta's Hannah Li with a 3-2 match. The bronze medal event for the same category saw Ontario's Tracy Yuen defeat Quebec's Lavoie Emmanuelle 3-2.

While the spectators remained loud as they cheered on their provincial counterparts throughout most of the matches, the gym quieted down considerably for the under-18 male gold medal event between the two Quebec players.

With the exception of some applause whenever Yang or Michaud made a good shot, there was no obvious favourite to win. Yang defeated Michaud 3-2 for the gold.

Meanwhile, the bronze medal went to Manitoba's Frederick Eng, who defeated Ontario's Ted Liu 3-2.

Prior to the medal finals, other table tennis players competed for their positions through the day.

On the Yukon's side, Malkolm Boothroyd and Ben Barrett-Forrest placed 15 and 16 of 22 positions in the under-15 male category, while Claire Abbott placed 16 and Anna Smith finished 20 of 21 positions in the under-15 female category.

In the under-18 group for the Yukon, Zara Bachli placed 17th and Karlie Knight placed 22nd of the 22 positions, while Zara's brother Ryan finished 16 and Willliam Kennedy finished in 22nd of the 22 positions in the male category.

Barrett-Forrest said Friday afternoon he was pleased he won a game against an Alberta player.

'The one game I beat him 11-5. I was pretty happy,' he said.

This was Barrett-Forrest's first Canada Winter Games, an experience he described as rewarding.

'It's just the amazing diversity of all the people and players who are here,' he said. 'And just to have everyone from across the country gathering in one place is really cool.'

Both Barrett-Forrest and Boothroyd will move up an age category by the time the Arctic Winter Games team is selected for 2008, head coach Kevin Murphy said this morning.

He's expecting that will mean a large selection of players in the under-18 category for the northern competition being held in Yellowknife next year.

Murphy said this morning the Canada Games showed the territory has a strong table tennis community and team.

In his estimation, the team proved stronger than teams fielded from Nunavut, Newfoundland and P.E.I., and the strongest team he's taken to a Canada Games.

That strength may have come from some of the motivation he used for the team through the week of competition.

He lost his moustache, one of his favourite pins, featuring Marvin the Martian playing table tennis, and now owes Boothroyd a new rubber covering for his paddle thanks to wins.

There was also another pin Murphy lost to Abbott when he thought Quebec would take gold in one of the medal matches.

He was also pleased to see the Bachli siblings play at such a competitive level.

'They did play at a very high level of competition,' he said, though both found themselves a little bit 'snake-bitten' at the end when they were defeated in some matches.

While Ryan found himself having trouble with a certain serve, Zara was feeling ill for her last matches.

While the team will primarily focus on next year's Arctic Winter Games, Murphy said he's also hoping to take a crew to the junior nationals competition in July.