Several months have passed since Hugo Calderano, Simon Gauzy and TTF Liebherr Ochsenhausen (5-3, 10:6) celebrated as they hoisted the 2024-25 German Table Tennis Cup trophy. Calderano and Gauzy are no longer with the team. Ochsenhausen now sits as Table Tennis Bundesliga’s fifth seed. They hope for a chance to make the postseason, let alone repeat as Cup champions.
But Shunsuke Togami remains from Ochsenhausen’s cup-winning club. And after Wednesday, his club is very thankful he’s still there.
Togami guided Ochsenhausen in their five-set victory over Post SV Mühlhausen (4-4, 8:8) during their 2025-26 German Table Tennis Cup quarterfinal match on Wednesday. The reigning champions’ quest for a second consecutive trophy will continue in January with another appearance in the Final Four.
The first game of this match pitted Togami (1) against Mühlhausen’s Ovidiu Ionescu (2). They alternated wins before Togami won the winner-take-all fifth game and put Ochsenhausen on the scoreboard (11-5, 8-11, 11-7, 5-11, 11-6).
Ochsenhausen’s fortune wouldn’t stick around. There wasn’t much that Tiago Abiodun (2) could do against Mühlhausen star Kay Stumper (1), who took the first game 11-9, the second game 5-11, and the third game 11-8.
It wouldn’t stay that bad for Ochsenhausen. It would only get worse. Andreas Levenko fought hard against Mühlhausen’s Marcos Freitas in the first game, but lost 5-11. After two heartbreaking losses for Levenko, a 5-11 smackdown in the second game and a 10-12 heartbreaker in the third, Freitas swept Levenko to put Mühlhausen just one set away from a Final Four spot.
And then, out came Togami.
It wasn’t a perfect set for Ochsenhausen’s star, as Stumper took the first game 11-7. But from then on, nothing came easy for Mühlhausen. Stumper’s endurance couldn’t match Togami’s, who won the second game 15-13 and the third game 12-10.
Despite Togami’s best efforts, Stumper won the fourth game 11-8. Just one more win would send Mühlhausen to the Final Four. Togami wouldn’t let that happen. He beat Stumper 11-9 in that fifth game to force a winner-take-all fifth set.
At first, it looked as though Togami’s victory was all for naught. Levenko and Abiodun carried their struggles into their doubles set against Ionescu and Freitas, losing the first game 4-11 and the second game 11-9. Once again, Ochsenhausen found themselves on the brink of elimination.
That’s when Levenko and Abiodun shifted into another gear. They brought a relentless fight into the third game before winning 16-14. They wouldn’t slow down in the fourth game either, winning 13-11 to force another fifth game.
At that point, Ionescu and Freitas started to cool off. The red-hot duo from Ochsenhausen saw an opportunity to finish them off. They clobbered Mühlhausen in the fifth and final game, 11-5, allowing Ochsenhausen to survive another possible defeat and secure their second straight spot in the Final Four.
Ochsenhausen now becomes the second team to make it to this year’s semifinals. They will join TTC OE Clarity Telefonie-Systeme Bad Homburg, who stunned Borussia Düsseldorf 3-2 on Monday to earn a second consecutive Final Four berth of their own.
The German Table Tennis Cup quarterfinals will conclude on Monday, when second division standout SV Union Velbert welcomes 1. FC Saarbrücken - TT (5-3, 10:6) at 12:30 p.m. EST, before TTC RhönSprudel Fulda-Maberzell (4-4, 8:8) takes on TTC Zugbrücke Grenzau (2-6, 4:12) at 1 p.m. EST.
The Final Four of the German Table Tennis Cup will take place on Jan. 4. All matches on that day will be streamed on Table Tennis TV, which you can find on TableTennis.TV, iOS, Roku, Apple TV and Amazon Fire TV.
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