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There is an Olympic sport in which the U.S. has never won a medal - table tennis. The U.S. women's team opens play tomorrow, and they have more attention than they've ever had before thanks to an unlikely superstar fan. NPR's Becky Sullivan met up with the team and has this story.
BECKY SULLIVAN, BYLINE: It's the kind of thing that can only happen at the Olympics. NBA star Steph Curry came up to his basketball teammate Anthony Edwards to introduce him to a group of women he'd just met.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
ANTHONY EDWARDS: In what - ping-pong?
SULLIVAN: The women are, of course, also Olympic athletes, the U.S. women's table tennis team - Amy Wong, Rachel Sung and Lily Zhang.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
EDWARDS: I don't believe it. I don't believe it.
SULLIVAN: There's some friendly trash talk. The women are pretty sure they could shut him out.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
EDWARDS: I'm scoring one point.
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #1: No way.
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON #2: (Laughter).
EDWARDS: One point. I'm scoring.
LILY ZHANG: I mean, there's only one way - to try it out.
EDWARDS: What - what - OK.
SULLIVAN: There's only one way - to try it out, you can hear Lily Zhang say. The video went viral, and it was the start of a crazy first week at the Olympics for the table tennis squad. Anthony Edwards came out to cheer on Zhang at her singles event last week, and the basketball team invited all the table tennis players to a practice.
(SOUNDBITE OF SNEAKERS SQUEAKING)
SULLIVAN: They traded autographs, and Edwards came over to say hi.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED RECORDING)
EDWARDS: Hey. Thank y'all for coming. Yeah, I had fun watching you.
ZHANG: It was just really cool to see him, and he said he really enjoyed watching us play, which was really cool to hear.
SULLIVAN: Spoiler alert, though - Lily Zhang says they haven't actually gotten to face off yet.
ZHANG: Yeah. We'd love to actually play (laughter).
SULLIVAN: They've heard this kind of thing before, they all say - someone who's not a table tennis player feeling so sure they could score a point or two. I asked them if they'd ever been like, you know what? Sure, let's play. Rachel Sung has been so good for so long that her story was about some guys in middle school.
RACHEL SUNG: And I think finally, during, like, our graduation pool party or something, I was like, fine. Like, let's play (laughter). Yeah, it didn't go so well for them.
SULLIVAN: Competitive table tennis is a whole different beast from what you might have played in your basement as a kid, Amy Wong says. The ball can reach speeds of 60 or 70 miles per hour, and the spin the players can put on the ball is wild.
AMY WONG: Usually, yeah, like, it's sad for them.
(LAUGHTER)
WONG: The outcome is pretty sad, and the reality hits when they know that table tennis is hard (laughter).
SULLIVAN: Since table tennis was introduced at the 1988 Olympics, the sport has been dominated by China, which has won almost every gold medal so far. But in the U.S., table tennis players - even professionals - must balance other priorities. Wong is a full-time premed student at UCLA. Lily Zhang is the veteran of the team. She's 28, and this is her fourth Olympic Games.
ZHANG: I have to manage my own schedule. I'm usually alone at tournaments, and it's tough. Like, it takes away from you really focusing on the table and your skills and what you need to do to improve. So if we had, like, that team around us, I think that medal is not so far-fetched anymore.
SULLIVAN: There are promising signs of progress, they say. Like, just last week their teammate Kanak Jha became the first American man to reach the round of 16 in an Olympic singles event. And for the women's team, Rachel Sung says, they just feel there's more people who care this year.
SUNG: I have noticed a lot more people, like, actually paying attention to our sport this time around in the Olympics, maybe thanks to our interactions with them. A lot of my friends have texted and being like, oh, my God. Like, all my other friends know about this, and they want to watch now, too. So I think it's definitely the step in media that we needed.
SULLIVAN: Team of Zhang, Sung and Wong begin their Olympic run Tuesday against Germany. Team USA basketball has to play this week, too, so Anthony Edwards can't come. But if the table tennis team makes it to the medal rounds on Sunday, Edwards says he'll be there. Becky Sullivan, NPR News, Paris.
(SOUNDBITE OF CORY WONG'S "KING BOZZI") Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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