NCTTA Newsletter  June 2013
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Sponsor Corner
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Special thanks to our sponsors, Butterfly and Newgy!  NCTTA, would like to thank Butterfly for its support of college table tennis. Butterfly is the exclusive NCTTA League and Championship Equipment sponsor for the 2012-2013 season. Grab all your favorite Butterfly equipment in the online Butterfly store.  Also, special thanks to NEWGY Industries, for its continued support of college table tennis Newgy offers a great way to fund-raise for your club and help out our sponsor as well by signing up and participating in their Newgy Robo Pong Affiliate Program.
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What Goes into the NCTTA Championships?
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 | Kagin Lee
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Ever wondered what it takes to put on the NCTTA Championships? Check out a blog on USATT's website written by the Tournament Referee and current NCTTA Board member, Kagin Lee.
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Dear Subscriber,
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Summer may mean a break from college table tennis competition, but there's still lots of college table tennis news to tell. From the US Open of Table Tennis to the World Championships and everything in between!
Read on for all this and more ...
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NCTTA Official Wins Mississippi Senior Olympics Table Tennis Gold Medals
|  Enjoying home court advantage, NCTTA media relations chairman Andy Kanengiser won two gold medals at the Mississippi Senior Olympics. The May 31 competition at Mississippi College's Alumni Gym attracted players from Texas, Arkansas, Louisiana, and Mississippi.
"Repeating as the Mississippi champion for my age group was fun, but really all the folks who packed their paddles and showed up were winners, too," said Kanengiser, a 61-year-old New Jersey native. "One of the players came from as far away at Lubbock, Texas. That shows tremendous passion for this fantastic Olympic sport."
Wrapping up his 6th year as Mississippi College's university news coordinator and sponsor of the school's No. 2 ranked table tennis team, Kanengiser was among several NCTTA connections at Friday's tournament.
Returning to run the Mississippi Senior Olympics tournament on the Clinton campus was Herb Bennett of Hattiesburg. The veteran US Postal Service employee served as the longtime NCTTA Dixie Division director until stepping down a year ago.
In the summer of 2011, Bennett competed in the National Senior Games in Houston, Texas and won 8th place for his 55 to 59 age division. In recent years, Bennett was the chief of the Southern Miss Golden Eagles table tennis team that once finished No. 2 in the final NCTTA standings. He's played the game for decades and has competed in USATT tournaments from Pensacola, Florida to north Alabama.
Another NCTTA tie to the Mississippi Senior Olympics was Mississippi College table tennis team coach Ken Qiu. The former MC captain set up all the tables and barriers for the tournament at Alumni Gym. More importantly, Coach Qiu practiced with Kanengiser, and offer a few tips about how to improve his game the night before the tourney.
It all worked out nicely for Mr. K, who was defending his 2012 Mississippi Senior Olympics title. The MC staffer was undefeated in singles events against two retired educators from Mississippi and Louisiana. Andy and his doubles partner, Tzusheng Pei, also captured Senior Olympics gold with three straight wins. A native of Taiwan with a doctorate from the University of Tennessee, Pei is a professor of computer science at Jackson State University. Professor Pei says it's always fun to see some old, familiar faces, plus welcome some new ones, at the Senior Olympics each year. Players must be at least 50-years-old to compete.
Kanengiser is eligible to participate in the National Senior Olympic Games in Cleveland, July 19 through August 1. Held every two years, the national games feature 19 sports, including golf, cycling, triathlon swimming, archery, table tennis, and something called pickleball.
The 2011 games in Houston attracted 10,100 athletes, including well-known regional table tennis players such as Denis Fritchie of Memphis. A member of the Memphis Table Tennis Club, Fritchie finished in 8th place in the 60-64 age division during the games in the Lone Star State.
Kanengiser credits his dad, Irving Kanengiser, with getting him interested in table tennis, basketball, and the newspaper business (where he worked for 32 years as a reporter before joining the Mississippi College staff in 2007). His dad was a top-notch table tennis and basketball player in high school and college in the 1930s and early 1940s before serving in the U.S. Army Air Corps in World War II.
Andy spent much of his growing up years battling his brothers, Bill and Marty, and sister, Francey, in table tennis tournaments in the basement of their home in West Orange, New Jersey.
The NCTTA media relations guy also picked up another Mississippi Senior Olympics gold medal in early May in a basketball shooting contest. A longtime New York Knicks fan going back to the Bill Bradley, Walt Frazier and Willis Reed days of the early 1970s, Kanengiser hit all ten free throws during competition at the Baptist Healthplex on the Mississippi College campus.
"The Senior Olympics is a great way to promote fitness and healthy lifestyles for America's seniors who love to compete,'' he said.
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Summer College Championships, ACUI Style
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While most College Table Tennis athletes are home for the summer or away at an internship, some are still playing - and in a serious way. Enter the 2013 ACUI Table Tennis Championships. ACUI is the Association of College Union International and their event is being held this year at Arizona State University June 27th/28th.
Both NCTTA schools and non-NCTTA schools are participating, and NCTTA's own President and long-time supporter of ACUI, Willy Leparulo, will be running the tournament. Leparulo says, "Back in the day before anything in College Table Tennis was organized, ACUI was the only organized competition and it was what we did, and they are still around now providing tournaments within their Leisure and Recreation program." ACUI is a nonprofit educational organization that brings together college union and student activities professionals from hundreds of schools in seven countries. Its members work on urban and rural campuses, in two-year and four-year institutions, and at large and small schools. They are students and administrators whose mission is to build campus communities.
ACUI supports 15 Regional tournaments where the top 4-6 men and women qualify to enter the Championship tournament. Leparulo adds, "ACUI is a good starting point for those wanting to do more than just play in the rec room, it opens all sorts of doors." Leparulo says that after playing in his first ACUI tournament in 1998 it gave him the confidence to start his own table tennis club at Florida State University. He then reached for more for College Table Tennis and applied for a volunteer position with NCTTA.
Winners of these ACUI Championships will have a chance at winning some money that can be put towards educational expenses like books and tuition. What a great deal for a couple days of summer fun with the ACUI Table Tennis Championships!
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Coach Fede Bassetti Builds Northern Illinois Table Tennis
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 Long ago in the bustling Italian seaport of Messina, Sicily, a young kid developed a love for table tennis playing in his church's game room. Kids who quickly exited Sunday Mass sprinted to the game room, grabbed a paddle and let out a scream, and got right to playing.
As a nine-year-old, Federico Bassetti, the son of a university athletic director, usually got clobbered at table tennis. But then the youngster began to develop his game thanks to two crafty coaches in southern Italy, Pino and Salvo. "I was a table tennis sponge - I just could not get enough of it,'' Bassetti recalls. "I was playing everywhere, even on the kitchen table at home and in the corridor against the wall and paintings."
While the Italian largely gave up the game to pursue his college degree in information science at the University of Turin, Fede shipped his youthful passion for the Olympic sport to the USA. Now, he's the successful founder and coach of the Northern Illinois University table tennis team that's got heads spinning in the NCTTA's Upper Midwest Division in its first season.
After growing from almost nothing except for a Facebook page, the Northern Illinois Huskies squad assembled a competitive team with players Wei-Min, Dat, Eric, Can Meng, and Kevin Tony. What began with two Asian choppers turned into something special in year one.
Wei-Min Kao won the Upper Midwest Division title, while Dat Nguyen got third place and advanced to the Midwest Regional. Wei-Min punched his ticket to the 2013 NCTTA Nationals in Rockford, Illinois in mid-April and advanced out of a group that included some of the best collegiate players in the USA and Canada. That's really incredible in year numero uno for NIU table tennis.
"Overall, it's just phenomenal that we got this out of nothing. It feels as if we started growing roses in the desert, and somehow we got the magic water."
Much of the credit goes to Coach Fede, a man who dreamed big on the DeKalb, Illinois campus. He started with no tables, no players, and not even a student organization before turning to Facebook to make an appeal to interested students to bring their paddles to practice.
Fede Bassetti isn't just content to be a top-notch table tennis coach at Northern Illinois. He teaches health information as an adjunct faculty member at NIU. And this fall, he will teach table tennis as a credit course in the school's Kinesiology and Physical Education Department. Coach Fede stays on the go as a leader of the NCTTA committees on coaching and technology, and teaches fitness classes to boot.
A former research associate at the Los Alamos National Labs in New Mexico, Bassetti earned a master's degree in computer science at New Mexico State, and continued his work in Illinois at the National Center for Supercomputing Applications. The facility hosts some of the most powerful computers in the world.
But entering his second year as Northern Illinois coach, he's trying his best to build a world-class collegiate table tennis team in 2013-14 and the seasons ahead. Northern Illinois is now home to Coach Fede and the rest of the Bassetti family. The family consists of Lynn, an assistant professor in public health and health education at Northern Illinois, and a little sheltie dog named Ricky. "I'm Fede and he's Ricky. He brings me luck at tournaments, but is not a big fan of practice time."
With so many things on his plate in the Land of Lincoln, Coach Fede has little free time for hobbies other than table tennis.
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Watch the US Open Live!
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The 2013 US Open and ITTF World Tour - America's Challenge will be streamed live from Las Vegas starting July 3rd. Check back here for more information! |
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Division Directors Needed for Upcoming Season
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NCTTA is looking for an "A-Team" of talented volunteers to step up and give back to collegiate table tennis. Opportunities are almost unlimited for men and women with a passion for this Olympic sport.
Division Directors: The ongoing division reorganization has opened a few new division director positions and NCTTA is looking for folks to fill openings in the following divisions:
- Canada East (formerly Eastern Canada 2)
- Downtown NYC
- Kansas
- Lower Midwest
- Michigan
- Minnesota
- Northwest
- Virginia
We're looking for people who know the ins and outs of the sport, can organize and run tournaments in their area and promptly check and return emails. Division directors cannot be a competing player in NCTTA competition.
There are some rewards for the hard work. The NCTTA will supply some financial assistance so division directors can attend the 2014 national championships. Plus an NCTTA polo shirt, USATT membership, and free umpire certification all come with the job. You say you feel you don't have exactly what it takes? NCTTA will supply the training.
How to apply: We want to know a little about your background and experience in table tennis and a brief bio would help. Send us a short statement of no more than 500 words about why you want to fill these shoes. Please send it by July 15th to info@nctta.org
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Lazy Summer Days Aren't So Lazy for City College of NY
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Albert Chieu and his CCNY teammates didn't get the memo about summer being a time to hang out at the beach, go to Disney World, and forget about table tennis for a bit. At least in the month of May they are busy competing in the New York Table Tennis League.
We asked him what this is all about and he tells us, "Pretty much a league of all NY clubs...clubs from other states in the Northeast can also join." Of course we wanted to know what other College Table Tennis clubs made it out for the weekly competition; Chieu adds, "so far CCNY is the only college team."
Most College Table Tennis clubs/teams are not active over the summer since most students go home, get a job. or even go back to their country of origin. Interestingly enough CCNY has enough students hanging out in the Big Apple over the first part of the summer break to create a team and compete weekly in this league where the winner gets to attend the USATT National Championships to play other clubs that are winners of their respective leagues. Seems a little bit like what we're used to in College Table Tennis, but run by the folks over at USA Table Tennis.
Whether it's fun in the sun or training in the gym, we here at NCTTA hope your summer is going well and that you eventually gear up for the new season coming up soon!
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| Texas Wesleyan Stars Play at 2013 World Table Tennis Championships |
By Andy Kanengiser
Media Relations Committee Chair
 Paris is home to world famous attractions such as the Eiffel Tower, the Notre Dame Cathedral, and wonderful cafes along the Seine. In May, the French capital also hosted the 2013 World Table Tennis Championships and its lineup of attractions included three star players from Texas Wesleyan University.
Mark Hazinski and Yahao Zhang played for the United States, while Emil Santos, the NCTTA singles champ, competed for the Dominican Republic. All represented the TWU Rams, the perennial USA collegiate powerhouse for the past decade, with a great deal of class. Marking his return to the World Table Tennis Championships in Paris, Hazinksi didn't win a title, but turned in solid performances. So did the other players from the Fort Worth campus.
"I did pretty well. ,I lost two close matches to players from Hong Kong and Argentina," said the tall and talented Indiana native. ,"None of us advanced out of the preliminary group. ,But we had a great time competing."
The fantastic table tennis matches in Paris attracted nearly 65,000 fans May 13-20., It wasn't all just cheering for some of the greatest table tennis players on the planet. ,In the city of millions of people, visitors could also snap pictures of terrific scenes - from the Arc De Triomphe to the Champs-Elysees.
When all was said and done at the World Table Tennis Championships, it wasn't just another sweep by Chinese standouts. ,This 52nd edition of the World Table Tennis Championships was a little different. Kim Hyok Bong and Kim Jong returned home as national heroes after they won the mixed doubles title for North Korea - the nation's third world title and first since 1977.
In men's doubles, Chen Chien-An and Chuang Chih-Yuan were the winners, taking home Taiwan's first ever world title. The three remaining winners were Chinese: Zhang Jike captured the men's singles title; Li Xiaoxia won women's singles and teamed with Guo Yue to win women's doubles.
Playing his favorite Olympic sport much closer to home, Mark Hazinski faced another superb TWU table tennis player, Jose Barbosa, at the halftime of a Dallas Mavericks basketball game. Their appearance in 2013 marked the second time that TWU table tennis stars put on an exhibition at the home of the NBA team in Texas.
There's a strong table tennis connection to the NBA hoops squad led by stars like Dirk Nowitzki in Big D. Mavs head basketball coach Rick Carlisle is an avid table tennis player who's in love with the fast-paced Olympic sport.
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Interested In Journalism? Write For NCTTA's Publications!
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ANY JOURNALISM majors or better yet JOURNALISM, ENGLISH graduates out there want a great volunteer gig? NCTTA is looking for an EDITOR and WRITERS for its website and newsletters:
http://www.nctta.org/newsletters/
This is a great opportunity for anyone looking to get their work released to different media outlets and help NCTTA with Blogging, Newsletters, Twitter, etc.
Click here to get involved with this committee or others.
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USATT Membership Discounts For NCTTA Graduates
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NCTTA has recently teamed with USA Table Tennis to create a special opportunity where recent NCTTA grads can take advantage of a 2-year USATT membership for 62 percent off of the regular price. Yes, you read that right 62% off. USATT membership is the best way to stay involved with table tennis after graduation. So take advantage of this great deal!
Read all about it at: nctta.org/alumni
NCTTA takes care of its alumni hoping that they then will return the favor to their collegiate clubs by donating their time or money or both to keep programs and teams alive. Keep involved!
Got an idea for a future story or newsletter topic? Email the NCTTA Media Relations Chair.
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Stay tuned for more exciting NCTTA news next month. Don't forget to click on the link below (Update Profile/Email Address).
Sincerely,
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