In College table tennis winning the “double double” is in reference to a school’s Men’s/Coed Team and Women’s team winning both championships in a said tournament. Ohlone College has done just that at the West Regionals at the SITTA club in Sacramento some weeks ago. Ohlone College, despite their smallish stature in terms of population (8,000 students) vs the juggernauts of the West Region like UC Berkeley, USC, etc., have really shown their true spirit. 

In addition to winning both team events, Ohlone players won the Men’s Singles and came in 2nd in the Women’s Singles. Bob Chen of Ohlone bested UC Riverside’s best, Victor Liu. On the women’s side San Jose State’s (which, by the way has got a great team this year) Yixiao Wang took out Ohlone College’s Qiao Jiao. 

West Region was missing a plethora of players due to the USA Trials the same weekend but still provided an insight to what will be one of the most competitive NCTTA Championships ever.

PIcture of Qiao Jiao (Pic by Xinye Ji)

In College table tennis winning the “double double” is in reference to a school’s Men’s/Coed Team and Women’s team winning both championships in a said tournament. Ohlone College has done just that at the West Regionals at the SITTA club in Sacramento some weeks ago. Ohlone College, despite their smallish stature in terms of population (8,000 students) vs the juggernauts of the West Region like UC Berkeley, USC, etc., have really shown their true spirit. 

In addition to winning both team events, Ohlone players won the Men’s Singles and came in 2nd in the Women’s Singles. Bob Chen of Ohlone bested UC Riverside’s best, Victor Liu. On the women’s side San Jose State’s (which, by the way has got a great team this year) Yixiao Wang took out Ohlone College’s Qiao Jiao. 

West Region was missing a plethora of players due to the USA Trials the same weekend but still provided an insight to what will be one of the most competitive NCTTA Championships ever.

PIcture of Qiao Jiao (Pic by Xinye Ji)

Underdog or surprise schools are just as much a part of sport as the favored school.  How many times have you seen a team and think “They have no chance” and when they start showing signs of life you back them because you want to see the underdog win? The University of Massachusetts at Amherst was not a seeded school in the Northeast Region hosted at the  Westchester Table Tennis club. 

Umass Amherst came through the prelim Round Robin winning all of their matches and into the QF, SF and Finals and they just kept winning! Northeast Regional Director Ariel Chen says “They were the never say die kind of team, they kept on fighting when all odds were against them, a fan favorite at the regional champs.” 

Coach Andrew Tan is always so eloquent in his replies and once said, “Life happens and it is never always perfect.” On this day, everything was perfect! Well done to Coach Tan and the players from UMass Amherst for giving the sportsfan in all of us an underdog to cheer for! Take note college table tennis fans this is how to support and fight for your team!

Picture of Umass Amherst team 

NCTTA’s Great Lakes Region is an altogether different region than most other college table tennis areas. It includes 2 divisions centrally placed in Canada (Greater Toronto and Canada East) as well as neighboring US-based college table tennis divisions. From NCTTA’s beginnings, Canadian college table tennis has and always will participate in our competitions. 

This year’s tournament was hosted by MyTTC Club in Mississauga and featured 10 Men’s/Coed Teams and 4 Women’s teams and a number of Men’s and Women’s singles to tote. Top schools in the Men’s/Coed competition were 3 out of 4 from Canada (University of Toronto, McGill and Western University) with Cornell University from Upstate NY holding up the US side. Canadian college table tennis is extremely strong. Toronto is led by Xuebo Li, Canadian Junior Table Tennis phenom. Universite du Montreal and University of Waterloo make up the other Canadian schools in the competition.The Women’s team competition featured much of the same Canadian super play with Western University besting University of Toronto. 

Generally Canadian schools have final exams around the NCTTA Championships, but if they can make it down this year, look for them to produce some quick looks and surprises.

They came, they saw and they dominated both the Men’s/Coed and Women’s Regional Team Championships. Duke University plays out of the NCTTA Carolina Division and for the most part they weren’t a known powerhouse until they came to Regionals and showed their colors. Duke University features men and women both well over 2000 which translated into a Regional Championship title in both areas!

Men’s and Women’s Singles were dominated however by newcomers, brothers from Montgomery College (new school to NCTTA) LeTuanKhoi and LeTuanKhai. The brothers brought their A game to the Lily Yip Table Tennis Center for the 1st and 2nd place honors. On the Women’s singles end, again a newcomer from Drexel University, Nhi Do bested Duke’s Claire Xiao (Duke) and Lucy Ma (UPenn) enroute to the title. 

Thanks to Lily Yip for hosting NCTTA’s Mid Atlantic Regionals. We always appreciate USATT clubs helping out!

Nhi Do from Drexel, Women's Singles Champ featured (Picture by Seemant Teotia)

The NCTTA 2020 South Regional Championships were held at the Texas Wesleyan Sid Richardson Gymnasium. For those who want to know  a little college table tennis history, this was the location of the 2005 and 2006 National College Championships! Fast Forward to 2020 and Texas Wesleyan is still among the most feared in college table tennis and is one of two scholarship schools in the nation. Mississippi College however has made a name for itself beating and being beaten by the Texas Wesleyan Rams. This year featured yet another majestic match up!

Mississippi College came in ranked slightly higher than the host school in the Men’s/Coed team competition, and with their new student athletes hailing from several South American countries as well as Russia they provided some firepower. MC would go on to defeat Texas Wesleyan in the Men’s/Coed team regional championships 3-1 as well as taking the Men’s singles championship with Vladyslav Totkalo defeating Texas Wesleyan’s left-handed master Raul Caballero Montes. 

Texas Wesleyan is very strong however in the women’s area as they took home the Women’s team title and the women’s singles championship with newcomer Jiaqi Lin defeating her teammate Zhen Deng ). 

One has to think with two scholarship table tennis schools that maybe the rest of the region isn’t so strong, but that’s not the case. UT Austin, coming in 3rd in Men’s/Coed teams and 2nd in Women’s teams, would be first place in most other regions. Let’s not forget UT San Antonio, Texas A&M University and Florida International University who are all looking for places in the wildcard for the National Championships.

Men's Singles final picture (by Grant Bergmann)

As always, we take pride in creating a positive environment for our student-athletes as well as our hardworking volunteer staff.

NCTTA Champs will take place as scheduled on April 3-5 at the Round Rock Sports Center in Round Rock, Texas. Round Rock Sports Center has implemented enhanced cleaning and sanitization, including adhering to the recommendations set forth in the U.S. EPA’s Emerging Pathogen Policy regarding cleaning disinfectants effective against the COVID-19 virus. We are working closely with our venue partners and aligning with local, state, and federal public health guidelines and agencies.

As the NCTTA Champs approaches, we will be constantly reviewing our health protection activities, public health messaging, hygiene and medical control measures with the aim of strengthening our COVID-19 response further in line with up-to-date public health advice and guidance, including that of the CDC.

NCTTA will start to invite teams and singles as early as tonight and certainly on Thursday, March 5th and in the following days. We are looking forward to an amazing event for everyone.

NCTTA Championship Committee

If you are staying inside and wondering what the next Netflix show to binge on put that on hold b/c NCTTA has some binge worthy Live Streams to watch!

2020 West Regional Championship - Coed Teams & Women's Singles
Saturday, February 29 - 11:00 AM Pacific Time

Link:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RZWsu9MZ0sU

2020 West Regional Championship - Women's Team & Men's Singles
Sunday, March 1 - 11:00 AM Pacific Time

Link:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=69hAiMrmodc

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2020 Northeast Regional Championship - Team Competition
Saturday, February 29 - 10:00 AM Eastern Time

Link:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F4MxJANLtkA

2020 Northeast Regional Championship - Singles Competition
Sunday, March 1 - 9:00 AM Eastern Time

Link:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tRil9_Neuvs

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2020 South Regional Championship - Teams
Saturday, February 29 - 2:00 PM Central Time

Link:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V4fw_7Ex2Hc

2020 South Regional Championship - Singles
Sunday, March 1 - 9:00 AM Central Time

Link:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ie1FbaetPuc
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2020 Great Lakes Regional Championships--Singles and Teams

Saturday February 29th-- 10:00 AM Eastern time

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=daysiSWjx3o

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2020 Midwest Regional Championship - Teams
Saturday, February 29 - 9:00 AM Central Time

Link:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=goRJnPHLAic

2020 Midwest Regional Championship - Singles
Sunday, March 1 - 9:00 AM Central Time

Link:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rGdIEsL4SZc

Want to win some money to support your team for the next school year? NCTTA is running a video contest open to all schools! Submit a short video of your school's "Journey to Nationals" for a chance to win $100 off of your school's registration next year. Deadline for submission is March 22nd. Remember to bring your camera to Divisionals and Regionals and submit your video below!

Submission link: https://forms.gle/7ghFQAPoArFEEkAN7