Meet the Camden Academy table tennis team heading to nationals, with an assist from Daryl Morey

While on a tour of Camden Academy Charter High School, Daryl Morey spotted a familiar piece of equipment.

“Are you playing table tennis here?” the 76ers’ president of basketball operations asked Dara Ash, Camden Academy’s principal.

That led to a meeting between Morey and Alla Lantsman, the calculus teacher who runs the after-school club that has since qualified for the American Youth Table Tennis spring scholastic national championship. Now, Morey and the Sixers are sponsoring the five-person team’s trip to that tournament, held Sunday in Richardson, Texas.

“It’s mind-blowing,” said Abdul Fofanah, a sophomore on the team. “I never thought I’d be able to go on a trip to Texas, like on a plane, and it being paid for me.”

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That touchpoint was possible because of Camden Academy’s involvement in former NBA player Shane Battier’s Take Charge foundation, a mentorship and college-prep program for juniors and seniors with which Morey and his wife, Ellen, have partnered. That the high school is around the corner from the Sixers’ practice facility offers opportunity for in-person visits from Morey and other Sixers staffers, rather than becoming just another charity endeavor for which the organization writes checks.

It’s also surprising-yet-unsurprising that the tables caught the attention of Morey, whose eclectic array of interests outside of building NBA rosters include writing a musical and playing chess.

He played table tennis “a lot” as a kid, he recently told The Inquirer, and even partook in a national individual tournament in Michigan where he was “wiped out by the eventual champion.” He picked the sport back up while running basketball operations for the Houston Rockets, because table tennis Olympians Jimmy Butler (not that one) and Tim Wang reside in the city. These days, one way Morey gets exercise is by playing at PingPod in Old City.

Lantsman, meanwhile, is far more than a math teacher and club adviser. She grew up playing table tennis in Russia and still competes locally and around the world and won a national tournament in her age group last summer. In 2021, she became the vice president of the West Jersey Table Tennis Club, which has been operating since 1966. She emphasizes that table tennis is “for everybody” — she regularly sees 90-year-olds playing in practice and competitive games — but, like any other sport, requires work to hone the physical and mental skill required to succeed. Overall fitness, footwork, coordination, and quick reaction time are crucial, she said.

“Some students come to me like, ‘Oh, I will beat you,’” Lantsman said. “But once they take [the] paddle, they realize that it’s not so easy. … You need to see what your opponent’s doing. You have different speeds. Different movements. You need to realize [your opponent’s] weaknesses to use to win.

“You’re always changing your game. You’re always analyzing. So it’s a lot of thinking, as well.”

Now, Lantsman is passionate about recruiting more young people to the sport, beginning at her school.

Last year, then-freshmen Fofanah, Eddie Cook, Jian Karlo Lopez-Jimenez, Chase Scotton, and Zy’air Simmons — who have been friends since fifth grade — decided to give the club a shot together. Fofanah proudly calls the group “nerds,” while Simmons acknowledged he has “never really been a type for sports.” And when they started playing, “we were not good. I’ll say that,” Fofanah offered with a chuckle.

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But they trained after school and on the weekends at the West Jersey club. With the help of the American Youth Table Tennis Organization, they now have three professional-caliber tables and 20 paddles at school.

“They are very, very devoted,” Lantsman said of her students.

Added Simmons: “Once I started playing, I really started to enjoy myself. … I can’t really put the words on it, but it’s great to have such [great] guys around me to play.”

The top two high school and middle school teams from each state are invited to the American Youth Table Tennis spring scholastic national championship, which begins with round-robin play before becoming a single-elimination tournament. But Camden Academy did not have funding in the budget for the trip, and some players recognized their parents also would not be able to afford the cost.

Lantsman thought of Morey but initially was reluctant to send an email asking if he would be interested in helping.

“He responded in three minutes,” Lantsman said. “... It’s huge for me that we have this opportunity to send our students.”

Five days after the Sixers were eliminated from the playoffs, Morey was inside Camden Academy’s cafeteria passing out his team’s official shooting shirts and shorts that the players will wear during the tournament. That their faces lit up upon receiving the Sixers gear was a reminder for Morey to keep in perspective the perks of professional sports “that you can get numb to.”

The team departed for the Dallas area this week, a trip Lantsman said has left some of her other students “a little jealous.” She hopes their accomplishment inspires more to join the club at Camden Academy and more schools to join them at the tables. Simmons, meanwhile, is feeling some nerves, because “I’ve never done something on this level.”

And Morey is looking forward to watching the tournament’s livestream, where those players will be representing Camden Academy and the Sixers.

“Us going to nationals,” Fofanah said, “when we first started, it was a joke. But it’s real now, so we’re going to show out.”