Ping Ping. Wiff whaff. Gossmia. Call it what you want but the Rams at Texas Wesleyan University call it table tennis and they’re pretty good too.
“We have a good team,” said Andreas Ball, one of the Rams top table tennis players. “We don’t have to fear any opponent. If we play at our best we can compete with anybody.”
They’ve won numerous national titles in men’s, women’s and mixed, but since the sport isn’t huge in the United States the roster resembles something you’d find at the United Nations. Not Fort Worth.
“They speak Spanish or German or Croatian like myself and another player, but we try to encourage everyone to speak in English when everyone is together,” said Jasna Rather, the Rams Head Coach.
And one of Rather’s best players is China native Sara Hazinski.
“I started when I was in China at the age of seven and I think my dad pushed me really hard to be good,” said Hazinski.
And Andreas Ball represents Germany. So what does he think of Dallas’ most famous German Dirk Nowitzki?
“I’m a big fan of Dirk Nowitzki obviously,” said Ball.
Schools like Ohio State, Stanford and Harvard come to mind when talking about the top table tennis programs in the country so how does NAIA Texas Wesleyan keep winning every year?
“We have to go around the United States and internationally to different tournaments to recruit our top players,” said Rather.
And the age old question why call the sport table tennis and not ping pong?
“Table tennis or ping pong it doesn’t matter,” said Rather. “It’s a fun game and it’s good for anybody to try to play.”
And at Texas Wesleyan, to win.
Watch the video in HD above produced by DFW Reporting – the only news team in Texas that only reports on positive news!
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