By 
By: KAYLA SMITH
Staff Writer
Get your sweatbands ready. The IU South Bend Student Activities Center will play host to a table tennis tournament March 14 and 15.
The tournament, hosted by The South Bend Table Tennis Center (SBTTC), will be free to watch, but only USA Table Tennis members can compete.
In order to register and become a member, you can call the SBTTC directly at 574-261-4545 and speak with Dan Seemiller.
A table tennis coach and former U.S. Olympic coach, Seemiller, currently serves as a director of the tournament as well as a coach for the center.
Although the tournament requires membership to USA Table Tennis, Seemiller said, “In the future we would like to host a student event, but have done it before and it was just not a big enough turnout for the tournament.”
Students are more than welcome to come out and join the event.
The annual tournament serves a range of different levels of competition, from the level of play and age of the competitor.
Two of the competitions are open singles and open doubles, meaning that anyone can play, no matter their level of skill.
With all of the events that the tournament will have Seemiller said, “I play, and I will be playing in the open singles tournament.”
Along with the South Bend club, several regional clubs from within the Midwest will bring their players for some competition on the courts. Some teams will even come representing their teams with logos on T-shirts, competition ready.
The upcoming tournament currently has 170 players.
Seemiller said “This registration is the largest amount in the last five years,” and that he only hopes to see higher numbers in the future.
Tournament play starts bright and early at 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. on March 14, and 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. on March 15.
