The newly-formed Crimson table tennis team opens its quest for the Ivy crown today against MIT at 2 p.m. in the Kirkland House Common Room.

"MIT is very good. They've sort of made a habit of sending men to the U.S. Nationals," captain Anders Carlsson said yesterday.

The squad plays the rest of its seven match schedule against Ivy Teams, beginning mid-February. MIT is competing in the Ivy group, replacing Dartmouth, which did not field a squad.

"The president of the league is from Yale, and he assigned us the toughest team first. I've heard that Yale is not that impressive, and I think we will definitely be able to beat them," Carlsson said.

Freshman Jeff Golan is ranked first on the squad, while Carlsson and Sheng Yang Chui round out the A team.

Robbie Farkas, Shyang Lai Kung, and Rick Climan are fourth, fifth, and sixth-ranked players, respectively, and will compete on the B team.

In competition, each player on the A team plays all three members of the opposing A team. B teams play in the same fashion.

Carlsson explained that all players are equally important, any individual victory is worth one point, and the team with the most victories wins.

Today's ping pong match will be played on one table and will be officiated by a referee and a linesman. Carlsson estimated that the match would last for about three hours.

Carlsson said that all of the paddlemen except Chui use the American, "handshake" grip on the racket. Chui, a Malaysian, employs the "pen-holder" grip.

With the pen-holder grip, the racket is held downward, with primarily the thumb and forefinger grasping the handle. The paddle is never reversed to a backhand side; the ball is hit with only one side of the racket.

The team has been practicing, without a coach, three times a week for two hours a session, since the beginning of the term, in the Freshman Union.