With the number of former champions dwindling, the 100th Manoa Cup stormed into this morning's quarterfinals with previous winners placed in the four corners.

Defending champion Kurt Nino will face Wade Nakamura in this morning's first match at 7 a.m., after ousting 2003 champ Kellen-Floyd Asao, 3 and 1, yesterday. That winner will face 2006 champ Jonathan Ota or Michael Park in an afternoon semifinal at Oahu Country Club.

On the other side of the bracket, four-time champion Brandan Kop will play TJ Kua, and two-time champion Travis Toyama takes on Alex Ching, yesterday's most ostentatious winner. Ching smoked Jared Sawada, 9 and 8, playing the front nine in 4-under and closing the match with an eagle putt on the par-4 10th. Ching, an OCC member, won every hole but the third, and was so disturbed by that he birdied the next three.

It was a startling display by an 18-year-old who might be Hawai'i's hottest golfer. In the past seven weeks he has won the Hickam Invitational and state high school championship. Last summer he captured the OCC Invitational and Optimist International Junior, then qualified for the Sony Open in Hawai'i.

But he along with Kua, a 2-and-1 winner over David Fink, Park and Nakamura — both 3-and-2 winners — have never been victorious in the state's legendary amateur championship. Until you are, you have no idea what it involves.

For Nino, who will be a senior at USF, it took five tries. He won the 99th Manoa Cup by an 8-an-7 score on a magical final day where he missed almost nothing.

The 2004 state high school champion out of Damien reached his first semifinal at age 14, but until last year he found only late frustration. Yesterday, he turned that around in a sequel to the 2003 Manoa Cup final, which Asao won, 8 and 7.

"I was trying to bring back good thoughts because that day I was playing really good," Asao said. "And then on the front nine he kind of reminded me of how I was playing that week."

Nino's birdie putts from 20 feet-plus on the first two holes immediately got Asao's attention. Nino would have two more birdies on the front and made the turn 5-up when he sank a 20-foot par putt on the ninth.

"He missed only one putt on the front side," said Asao, a former University of Hawai'i golfer who is working at Newtown Driving Range while he contemplates turning pro.

Then it got interesting. Nino's left hamstring started to hurt as they headed up Nu'uanu Valley. He began to pull tee shots and miss desperation putts. Nino, who three-putted OCC's treacherous greens just twice in this tournament last year, three-putted three times in a four-hole span to see his lead shrink to 2-up after the 14th.

"He put some pressure on me, that was fun," Nino said. "That made me grind out the round. ... It was a mental game after that."

Asao's comeback crashed and burned on the next hole when his drive went out of bounds.

"I thought I hit it good and it dropped straight down," he said. "But then it flew into the bush and I was kind of shocked."

Nino is 20 and Toyama, who became the youngest Manoa Cup winner in history when he captured the 2002 Cup at 15, a year older. Ota, 46, and Kop, 47, could be their fathers.

They hardly looked their age yesterday. Ota never trailed in a 6-and-4 win. Kop, inducted into the Hawai'i Golf Hall of Fame this year, was able to shake off an only-at-OCC birdie putt by opponent Bou-An Fujieki that cut his lead to 1-up after 14: from 25 feet below the hole, Fujieki putted a foot past. The ball stopped, rolled back an inch, stopped again and then was shockingly pushed into the hole by a gust of wind.

"One more second and I would have picked the ball up," Kop said. "It rolled right back into the hole, dead center. I just had a feeling the ball would do that."

Kop, who has seen pretty much everything at OCC, was not fazed. He sank a 6-foot birdie putt on the next hole while Fujieki missed one of the same length. Both parred the 16th to dormie the match and Kop all but clinched it when he drove the green at the par-4 17th.