The Texas Wesleyan University Table Tennis team punched its ticket to the NCTTA National Championships with a victory at the South Region Tournament in the Sid Richardson Center this weekend.

National Championship bids were on the line all weekend, as the top three coed teams earned spots along with the top women's team. In addition, the top eight men's singles and top four women's singles players earned automatic qualifications.

The Rams ripped off 4-0 wins over TCU, UT-Austin and UT-Dallas in pool play then won 4-0 over Georgia Tech and the University of Florida in route to a showdown with rival Mississippi College. In the finals, Texas Wesleyan won with a 3-1 score.

The Lady Rams had similar success with 4-0 wins over TCU, UT-Austin and UT-Dallas in a round robin competition.

In the coed team competition Texas Wesleyan was followed by Mississippi College, Florida and Texas. In the women's team competition, Texas finished second, followed by UT-Dallas and TCU.

The Rams also swept the singles titles with Jishan Liang taking the men's draw and Weiting Zha topping the women's draw.

In men's singles, Jishan Liang defeated Mississippi College's Xiang He in a five-set final. Jason Plog (Texas Wesleyan), and Jinxin Wang (Texas Wesleyan) were also semifinalists while Qingwei Sun (Mississippi College), Tong Zhang (Mississippi College), Bruno Ventura Dos Anjos (Texas Wesleyan), and Tomotaka Yoshitomi (Mississippi College) advanced to the quarterfinals.

In women's singles, Zha defeated Ana Aleksandric 3-0 in the finals, while Edina Haracic and Viyaleta Manastyrskaya were also semifinalists.

The NCTTA National Championships will be held in Round Rock, TX, April 18-22. The Rams have won 65 National Championships in Table Tennis including 13 Coed Team titles and seven Women's Team titles.