Sports Editor
Peter Hockaday
peterhockaday@dailyemerald.com
Tuesday, February 11,2003
-Oregon Daily Emerald
Sports
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Run, Forrest, run,
away from painful
pingpong tourney
Bum.
Bum bum bum.
Bum bum bum.
Bum bum buuuuuuuuum.
That’s me, Rocky blaring from the stereo, standing in my
T-shirt and boxers in front of the mirror, punching my re
flection like the famous pugilist.
It’s time.
For nin£t>on£.
That’s right, I’m psyching myself
up for a pingpong tournament. So
what? Pingpong is a serious sport.
Anybody who’s seen Forrest Gump
knows that.
And I thought I was Forrest.
Oh, how wrong I was.
I had wanted to enter the intramu- |
ral pingpong tournament since my |
Peter
Hockaday
Two minutes for
crosschecking
freshman year. I played hours or ping
pong in high school and was, essential
ly, champion of my school. We played
on a plywood board set up on two
trash cans, and I was King of the Ply
wood, taking on all challengers and
beating them soundly before the end
of-lunch bell.
But when I got to college I just didn’t have the time for
table-tennis training. It was sad, really. I played occasionally
at The Break, but only in between games of Quarterback
Challenge.
I still wanted to enter that tournament, just to weigh my
self against the Oregon competition, see how I stacked up.
But I was always busy each year.
This year, I finally caught a break, an open schedule on
the big day, a Sunday two weeks ago. I signed up.
I’m fully psyched by the time I get to Gerlinger. The ath
letic juice is flowing through my veins, the kind of juice that
I envision flows through the veins of Michael Jordan before
he steps on the court.
But then I step into the pingpong gym, and right in front
of me is a student who I later learn is the pingpong club
team coordinator. He’s taking his paddle out from a ping
pong paddle case, like a mini tennis racket case.
I have two thoughts.
“Oh. No.”
And things don’t get any better. The format of the tour
nament is a round-robin seeding set of games, followed by
a bracket.
I find out that my four-player round-robin group consists
of me, Lee (the pingpong instructor at Oregon), Vivien (who
later loses in the tournament’s final) and Nick (the afore
mentioned club coordinator).
Vivien’s last name is actually Pong.
I’m in for a rough afternoon.
I hold short-lived leads on Vivien and Nick, but in the
best-of-five matches, I don’t win a single game in the round
robin portion. I figure I’ll face a high seed in the bracket and
leave the premises early.
But then I get a blessing from the intramural people run
ning the tournament. A play-in game. In the play-in game, I
face a student who went through the round-robin tourna
ment in similar fashion to me; that is, he didn’t win a game. I
like my chances.
I win the first game, start looking around the other tables
to scout out my possible second-round competition. But
then my competitor wins the second game.
OK, fine.
Then he wins the third game handily to go up 2-1. Then
he takes a 9-4 lead in the fourth game, with the games
played to 11.
OK, tough guy. You might be good, but I’m Forrest Gump.
I come back and tie the game at 10. Have to win by two,
so we battle back and forth, neither able to put the game
away. Finally I win it at 16-14.
As we switch sides, we look at each other, the glance con
taining a mix of I’ll-get-you machoism and who-cares-either
one-will-lose-the-next-match shame. We’re headed to a fifth
and deciding game.
But it doesn’t go well. He goes up big at 5-1, then 7-3, then
10-4. My serve. I win both. Break both his serves. He actual
ly says “Jesus” at one point. I try not to think about the pos
sibility of a comeback.
Then it happens. I’ve come all the way back at 10-10. We
Turn to Hockaday, page 10A
Tennis, tabled
Participation in the Club Sports
Pingpong team has been
dwindling, but that hasnt shaken
the enthusiasm of the players
Jon Roetman
Sports Freelancer
Participating in one of the few events
that causes people to stare at a table
endlessly, Tong Johnson and Vivien
Pong battle for the intramural table ten
nis championship.
Exchanging volleys at a feverish
pace, the duo mesmerizes the sur
rounding audience.
“Someday,” Nick Gillespie and Eric
Reinemann said, as they watched envi
ously, hoping one day to be as good.
Whack! With the games’ final point,
Johnson has won his second consecu
tive intramural championship, defeating
Pong three games to none.
This championship matchup was ex
pected, though, as Johnson and Pong
are two of the most talented members
of the Oregon club table tennis team.
Johnson, a second-year masters stu
dent from China, and Pong, a second
year masters student from Hong Kong,
have been playing pingpong, a monster
sport in Asia, since they were little.
“I play pingpong like Americans play
basketball,” Johnson said.
Pingpong is a game Americans often
misunderstand, unaware that it’s more
than a garage activity.
“It’s hardly recognized as a serious
sport here,” said Gillespie, a sophomore
and student coordinator. “Most people
kind of snicker when you tell them you
play table tennis.”
Gillespie, who grew up in Eugene, has
been playing pingpong for eight years.
Club participation has dropped from
Turn to Pingpong, page 10A
Photo illustration Mark McCambridge Emerald
Pingpong is a game of speed and many types of slices, according to head coach Lee Werthamer.
The Club pingpong squad ispreparingtoplayatoumamentin Seattle on Feb. 22
Race tightens for Pac-10 crown
Mark McCambridge Emerald
Cal's Gabriel Hughes, Joe Shipp and the Bears sit second in the Pac-10.
No. I Arizona, despite struggling against the
Washington schools, holds a one-game lead over Cal
Men’s Pac-10 notes .
Adam Jude
Senior Sports Reporter
Despite narrow victories at Washington and Washington
State last weekend, Arizona jumped back into the top spot in
the national polls Monday.
More importantly, Arizona (18-2 overall, 10-1 Pacific-10
Conference) remained No. 1 in the Pac-10, maintaining a one
game lead over California. The Bears (16-4, 9-2), by sweeping
Oregon and Oregon State, jumped back into the national rank
ings at No. 22 in the Associated Press poll (23rd in the
ESPN/USA Today coaches’ poll).
Stanford (17-6, 8-3) is the only other Pac-10 team ranked (No.
24 by the AP). Oregon is not ranked for the first time in 13 months.
With seven conference games remaining, Cal seems to have a
more favorable schedule than Arizona. The Bears have four
games at home — including Washington State and Washington
this week — and two of their road games are at UCLA and USC.
Cal and Arizona meet in Berkeley on Feb. 27.
The Bears have not been surprised by their success this
season, even though the media projected them to finish fifth
in the conference.
“Our goal is to win the Pac-10, and we’re going to do that,”
Cal’s Joe Shipp, the Pac-lO’s scoring leader, said after the Bears’
Turn to Men's, page 12A