LONDON — For the last four years, Ariel Hsing, 16, has played table tennis at least three hours a day, six days a week. Her parents set up a special room for the game at the back of their house in San Jose, Calif. Out went the porch, the fountain and the flower beds. In went a well-lighted space for a table and a ball-return machine. Live-in coaches were flown in from China.
Her father, a computer software engineer, left his job with IBM so he could work from home, available to ferry his daughter to practices and matches. Hsing’s schoolwork was never compromised. The deal was that every report card had to be straight A’s or table tennis would be withheld. A 91 on a grammar test once put her oh so close to a B.
On Sunday night, all this effort nearly paid off with an incredible upset as Hsing — ranked No. 115 in the world — nearly beat the second seed in the Olympics, Li Xiaoxia of China. The score was 11-4, 9-11, 11-6, 6-11, 11-8, 11-9.
The match began as expected, with Li, 24, an elite player for the world’s table tennis superpower, coasting to an 8-0 lead in the first game.
But then Hsing, a thin, jaunty player with a ponytail, shrugged off her nerves and began handling her opponent’s fierce forehand. In the final games of the third-round match, both players were emotional, pumping their fists and swiping at the air, reacting to every point.
Hsing played well all day. In the morning, she upset Ni Xia Lian, a Chinese-born athlete now playing for Luxembourg. The match was a battle of the ages. Ni, a former world champion, is 49 and a mother of two. She has a 20-year-old son.
Wisdom often comes with age, but this time age came alone. By her own admission, Ni entered the match overconfident, attending only one of the warm-up sessions. She had easily defeated Hsing two years ago and was startled to discover the teenager now had an answer to her short strokes.
The match seesawed: 11-9, 10-12, 11-9, 11-5, 10-12, 12-10. Under pressure, it was the older woman who lost her composure, stomping her foot and berating herself for mistakes.
“Ariel played a near-perfect game against Ni Xia Lian, close to as good as she can possibly play,” said Gheorghe, a Romanian who played professionally in Europe.
The coach, though delighted with Hsing’s play, has actually been wistful throughout the tournament. On Sunday, he again looked into the future and saw regret.
“Too bad Ariel has to go to college,” he said.
The United States Olympic women’s table tennis team is made up of three 16-year-olds from California. Hsing is the best. Lily Zhang, who is from Palo Alto, lost in the first round. Erica Wu of Arcadia will not play until team competition begins. Each is an honor student.
And the educational clock is ticking. After 16 is 17. After 17 is college.
“Ariel and Lily are in the top 20 in the world in the junior rankings,” Gheorghe said. “They are great for their age. If they stay with it, in 5 or 6 or 10 years, they will be in the top 20 in the world.
He was proud of the girls but spoke as if they were beautiful buds that would never fully flower. In Europe or Asia, he said, the teenagers would already have spent years in a sports academy, devoting their time to nothing but table tennis. Endorsement deals would fill their bank accounts. Fame would accrue as they played on the professional circuit.
But instead the girls talk about going to Stanford, or maybe Princeton. Hsing and Wu are about to be seniors, Zhang a junior. They carry homework to tournaments and fret over honors and advanced placement courses. Wu was thrilled to be in England. “I learned in A.P. European that really important stuff happened in London,” she said.
Wu said she wanted to be a veterinarian. Hsing foresees a career in business, and good connections already have been lobbed her way. Two older table tennis enthusiasts, Warren Buffett and Bill Gates, have befriended her and publicly conferred their esteem.
Gates watched Sunday’s match against Li. “You were nothing short of phenomenal,” he told Hsing, seeking her out when it was over.
Michael Cavanaugh is the chief executive officer of USA Table Tennis. He, too, sees college and career siphoning off the nation’s table tennis talent. But he is also optimistic, he said. More young Americans are taking the sport seriously. In 2008, the American women’s team was made up entirely of Chinese-born women. The three 16-year-olds are American born.
“We’re growing our own,” Cavanaugh said happily.
But if the harvest is American, the seeds were imported. The parents of the teenagers were all born in Taiwan or China.
Hsing’s mother and father grew up playing table tennis. Both are computer engineers. Ariel is their only child.
Ariel’s parents said they were immensely proud she made it to the Olympics — and they will be equally proud if she sticks with her studies and goes to Stanford or Princeton or wherever.
But her fine play Sunday only re-emphasized the choice ahead: Will she fully dedicate herself to table tennis or go straight to college?
On Sunday night, Hsing seemed to agree. “Maybe I can take a year off and play the professional tour,” she said.