NCAA Women’s Table Tennis: It’s On Its Way!

Dennis Davis

By Dennis Davis, USATT NCAA Committee Chair

"Once women’s programs are offered at the university level, the youth activities explode. I have seen this happen with soccer, and now I am seeing it with women’s rowing." -Ted Leland, Athletic Director, Stanford University

I believe the above quote is absolutely true for table tennis.  If college table tennis scholarships were available at top universities, and it was promoted correctly, there would be a many orders of magnitude increase in the number of U.S. juniors playing competitive table tennis.   At the first Women’s Soccer World Cup in 1991, the U.S. won.  The reason is directly attributed to the collegiate soccer infrastructure.  The U.S. women’s soccer team continues to mostly dominate international play.  They are always one of the favorites. 

The reason that the USATT NCAA Committee is focusing on women’s table tennis is related to a law passed by the U.S. Congress in the 1970s called “Title IX.”  This law ensures gender equity in athletic opportunities at university and high school athletic departments.  To this day most schools have a difficult time complying with the law.  The NCAA has started a program called “Emerging Sport for Women,” which creates a faster and easier pipeline to introduce women’s sports into the NCAA Championships.  Adoption of these sports helps the member schools comply with the law.  Our focus is to introduce table tennis to the NCAA family as an “Emerging Sport for Women.”

The NCAA (National Collegiate Athletic Association) is an organization through which the nation’s colleges and universities govern their athletics programs. It comprises more than 1,000 colleges and universities committed to the best interests, education and athletics participation of student-athletes.

There are a number of challenges to get through before we accomplish the goal of being an “NCAA Championship Sport.”  The process will take about 6-10 years to complete.  One of the main issues is to educate table tennis athletes, coaches, parents, tournament directors and administrators about the NCAA’s very strict athlete eligibility requirements to be allowed to compete in NCAA competition.  Essentially an athlete is ineligible if they have received ANY sponsorship benefits or prize money, no matter how small.  There will need to be a dramatic shift in how junior sponsorships are awarded as well as how tournaments are organized to protect an athlete’s eligibility status.  The following action items will take place over the next year in this specific area.

1. Marketing material will be created to thoroughly educate the athletes, coaches and parents about the future of table tennis in the NCAA and how to protect eligibility.

2. Create a sponsorship system in cooperation with table tennis equipment manufacturers/distributors that protects the NCAA eligibility of the athletes.

3. Create a process for tournament directors to follow to protect athlete’s eligibility.  This will be done in cooperation with the USATT Tournament Committee.

Most current players are ineligible for NCAA competition but there is a chance that the NCAA will grandfather some portion of current players as eligible.  The main goal is to help the next generation of young players remain eligible for the future.

As stated before this is a 6-10 year process but with correct planning and consistent efforts we hope to create the infrastructure necessary to consistently compete with the top countries in the world.