Quincy University kicked off spring intramural sports with a mock dodgeball tournament in the Health & Fitness Center at 10 p.m. where students created teams of eight to ten on Monday, February 5.

Students were provided with free pizza, and t-shirts were given to the winners.

The majority of the participants consisted of the QU wrestling team and the soccer team. However, there were a few members of cheer, golf, and band who participated.

Students who didn’t participate in the tournament free play watched from the sideline of the HFC, supporting the games.

Many students were troubled at the time of this event, which wasn’t practical for most athletes who participated.

One cheerleader, Soren Pine, said her participation in the tournament was unexpected.

“I never signed up for this, or thought I would ever be interested in doing intramural sports, but it was surprisingly a lot of fun,” Pine said.

Although Pine said the time of the tournament wasn’t convenient to her schedule, she enjoyed her experience playing with other teams she wouldn’t normally interact with on campus.

Intramural sports give the non-athletes, as well as athletes on different QU sports teams, the opportunity to participate in recreational sports with no extreme pressure. Students create their own teams to compete against each other.

The wrestling team stood out and won most of the matches played.

“I really got into the game. It was good competition,” Dalton Schell, a wrestler, said.

Schell thinks he will sign up for more intramural sports with the wrestlers for fun, and for a way of team bonding off of the mat.

The dodgeball tournament was just practice for the actual tournament coming up in the next few weeks which organizer Alexis Stufflebean says to look out for.

Stufflebean and Demari Wilson, a senior, started the initiative for intramural sports at QU.

“These sports will give people something to do, I think it’s a great idea for those wanting a break from their own sport,” Stufflebean said.

Stufflebean and Wilson hope to grow the intramural program at QU this spring and expand the opportunities on campus. They do, however, see challenges that face the program’s participation.

Because most students at QU are in regular season sports, they are less likely to join intramural sports because of time commitments, injuries, overloaded schedules, or simply because they just don’t feel the need to. Stufflebean and Wilson are trying to change this view.

By trying to give students a wide selection of sports they may be interested in, more accessible schedule times, and an easy going, excited environment, they think students will want to show up and show out for intramural sports.

There are more tournaments to look forward to in more intramural sports than just dodgeball. Students in all regular sports can participate in these recreational activities including volleyball, pickleball, wiffleball, flag football, kickball, spike ball, sand volleyball, basketball, and darts.

Students are encouraged to sign up with the IMLeagues app.