Budding UC Irvine Player Wears Multiple Hats at Champs

By Michael Reff
NCTTA Media Committee

University of California, Irvine player Hitoki Kidahashi is not your typical college freshman. Born in Japan, he then moved to China at a very early age, ultimately ending up in Hawaii. Kidahashi is an ambitious Computer Science/Japanese double major hoping to add a 3rd field of study in either education or general engineering to his already packed schedule.

In addition to his intense passion for table tennis, he’s also an internationally ranked Rubik’s cube puzzle solver.

Kidahashi wears multiple hats at the 2022 championships. For UC Irvine he’s basically every officer and position imaginable for the team: president, treasurer, team manager, team captain, training and on court coach, as well as safety, cleaner, and equipment manager! He’s also participating in the Men’s singles, doubles, and Coed teams events.

Consequently, he’s a perfect candidate for NCTTA volunteerism. Kidahashi caught the NCTTA volunteering bug after participating in the West Regionals and hearing about another player going to nationals as a volunteer. He found out about the different positions he could do in the Champs and reached out, inquiring, “Do you guys need more volunteers? I can help,” ultimately signing up for the Registration area.

After volunteering Thursday afternoon, he proceeded to diligently help his team in an evening multi-ball practice to prepare for their ensuing competitions.

When asked about what motivates him to take on so many responsibilities, he responds with computer programming humor: “recursion.” He says that because he is in multiple positions, it makes him inevitably take on more tasks. This recursive trait might be easily identified as a dominant one in the genetic makeup of all our loudnproud volunteers at the NCTTA!

Kidahashi has said that he used to think he was an introvert early in life, but ultimately realized he just needed to bond with people of shared interests. In high school he already demonstrated leadership skills as he managed the Rubik’s cube and cyber security club.

He has found his niche in table tennis, and, as NCTTA is the ultimate college table tennis social network, we hope to see him for many years to come as the multihyphenated NCTTA player volunteer!

About 2022 NCTTA College Table Tennis Championships

The championships are hosted by the National Collegiate Table Tennis Association and the Round Rock CVB. Men’s and Women’s Singles and Doubles, and Men’s/Coed Teams, Women’s Teams.
The event is sponsored by Double Happiness, Double Fish and Joola.
Watch the event on live stream starting Friday April 8th on champs.nctta.org

About NCTTA

The National Collegiate Table Tennis Association (NCTTA) is a non-profit organization established exclusively for promoting the sport of table tennis at the college level. As the national governing body for college table tennis in the United States and Canada, NCTTA organizes elite intercollegiate competition throughout North America. www.nctta.org