NTU Spirit Night

By Tessa Cho

PHOTO: LEOW TIEN LENG

Bringing together all of NTU’s sports representatives, the school’s athletes were appreciated for their contributions with an award presentation at the NTU SPIRIT Night.

The event, held in celebration of the university’s sporting achievements over the academic year, kicked off on 28 Mar at NTU’s LT1A, with more than 150 NTU athletes in attendance. The term ‘SPIRIT’ stands for the values that the university wants to see in its athletes –– Sportsmanship, Perseverance, Integrity, Respect, Inspiration and Teamwork.

At the event, NTU’s stellar performance in the recent Institute-Varsity-Polytechnic (IVP) Games and Singapore University Games (SUniG) were honoured.

PHOTO: LEOW TIEN LENG

IVP records broken

The recent IVP Games, held in January and February this year, saw the school’s athletes clinch eight out of 17 championship titles available. This saw NTU emerging as the Best Performing Institution among all participating polytechnics and universities.

With a record eight titles at this year’s IVP Games, NTU has bettered its showing from last year. It also won the highest number of championships in the last decade.
Several other outstanding performances were also commended: the Floorball Women’s team was defending champion for the third year running, while the Table Tennis Women’s team defended their championship title for its sixth consecutive year. The Swimming Women’s team also broke its nine-year medal drought by claiming the championship title.

Outgoing captain of the NTU Swim Team, Andy Leong, 22, said that the team’s months of blood and sweat had paid off.

“The months leading up to IVP had been tough for the whole team. Holidays were spent on training but we were glad that we emerged stronger as a team, and even managed to clinch the Women’s championship title,” said the second-year student from the School of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering.

A stellar showing at SUniG

Despite finishing second in this year’s SUniG, NTU hauled the most number of medals — 65 in total — among all six participating universities, National University of Singapore (NUS), Singapore Management University (SMU), Singapore University of Technology and Design (SUTD), Singapore Institute of Management (SIM) and Singapore Institute of Technology (SIT). The Basketball Women’s and both Football Women’s and Men’s teams defended their titles at least four consecutive times.

In the coming months, selected NTU athletes will be sent to Palembang, Indonesia to compete internationally — this time at the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) University Games. NTU is expected to send representatives for at least 11 of the 19 sports at the ASEAN University Games.