Penn Table Tennis wins regional, prepares for national championship

After winning regional events in co-ed, women’s and singles, Penns Club table tennis team advances to table tennis nationals.

Penns Club table tennis team were competing in the Pennsylvania Division of the National Collegiate Table Tennis Association on February 4th and in the Mid-Atlantic Regional Division on February 18th. The team defeated the University of Maryland, Carnegie Mellon University, University of Pittsburgh, and Duke University in the Mid-Atlantic Regionals in Atlanta.

The team’s performance earned them a spot at the NCTTA National College Table Tennis Championships in Round Rock, Texas on April 14th. The Penns team is also the highest ranked team in the Mid-Atlantic region in both singles and women’s minor leagues.

In the regional tournament, the team lost only to the University of North Carolina-Charlotte.

This season, Penn won every event in the Pennsylvania Division, winning events for the co-ed team, women’s team, men’s singles and women’s singles. At regionals, the women’s team placed first, and team members placed first and second in men’s singles and second in women’s singles.

Team members attribute this success to a combination of factors, including a number of strong recruits as well as the continued efforts of club management to maintain training practices.

This year we got two new players, three including myself, and they are really strong and [some] have represented their home countries in the past, College freshman and team member Rachel Ou said, citing that luck had been on the Penns’ side in recruiting this year.

In addition, Engineering sophomore and team captain Cheryl Lim mentioned new and improved practice strategies. Lim said the new players benefited from these training sessions, which exposed them to tournament caliber.

We tried to include more educational events; the club’s management decided to hold training events to help the team better prepare for tournaments, Lim said.

However, competing against high-level players is not the first time for the Penns table tennis team or its members. The team has qualified for the nationals before in 2017, and the member participated in the Olympic trials and the Youth Olympic Games.

Tze Ling Ng, a master’s student in the College of Liberal and Professional Studies and a member of the team, described how the team environment is more than a club.

It’s exciting because I think the fun thing about racing now isn’t so much the actual racing. I play table tennis more for community, Ng said.

In the same way, the players expressed enthusiasm about their table tennis trips and their experience with the sport.

Ou said table tennis is often thought of as a recreational sport, but it can become really competitive. He added that the club is not just for advanced players.

“We have players of all skill levels, so it’s pretty easy to find someone to play with,” Lim said.

Ou, Lim and Ng said they are proud of their performance so far and look forward to more success in the national competitions. At the moment the team is tenth nationally and travel to Round Rock, Texas for nationals in mid-April.