OVER THE ENGE Febrary 13-27, 2008

8 Sports and Clubs —

Muffin Stuffers Dodge Their Way | Into History

ANDREW KURJATA

Actine Eorror in CHier

The Muffin Stuffers - consisting of Shayna Mason, Lucas Adams, Jared Davis, Chris Wilson, Elyse Elmslie, and Greg Hubbert - secured a place in UNBC history on January 26, as the winners of the first “Dodge Your Balls” tournament, organized by NUGSS and held at the North- ern Sports Centre. They had to beat out 23 other teams in a highly- successful knockout tournament that saw participation from over 150 people, including yours truly. In high school, any time the teacher made the mistake of asking my gym class what we wanted to play the answer was invariably the same: cones, a variation on dodgeball in- volving - well, trust me it was pretty much the greatest game ever. But after graduating, I feared dodgeball would be out of my life forever. I had visited some friends at the Uni- versity of Alberta once, and the resi- dences there had a robust dodgeball culture - alumni games and every- thing. However, since UNBC is somewhat smaller and at the time lacked an on-campus gymnasium, the thought of replicating it here at home seemed somewhat unlike- ly. That’s where James De Vuyst, VP Social for NUGSS, comes in. “The idea for dodgeball came dur- ing our weekly Events Planning Committee meetings,” he explains. “We were trying to think of a wel- come back thing for the new and returning students, and this idea [came up].” The committee felt that it would appeal to a wide variety of students, and would be a good way to make use of the new North- em Sports Centre. They worked quickly to put their plan into action, and within a month were armed and ready. And so were students.

“T was really surprised at the turn- out,” says De Vuyst. “We estimated 20 teams, and we thought that was unrealistic, but I like to think big. In the end we had... to turn some away due to time restrictions.” And there was more to it than just getting the teams. Since there is hope to make this an annual tournament, money was spent on getting trophies that would last through the years. And then there were the balls. “My dodgeball history goes as far back as high school, where we would use volleyballs and those rubber ones. Those hurt!” says De Vuyst. For this tournament, he ordered profes- sional dodgeballs which - for those who still remember the large, sting- inducing rubber ones - are smaller in size (6-8 inches) and coated in foam to minimize the pain of impact while still maintaining a strong level of throwing speed and accuracy. While the new balls make for a safer game, they also change some of the tules - for example, you are no long- er allowed to block incoming balls with one you are holding. “Since the ball is so small, it’s impossible

to tell if it hit the ball or your hand,” |

explained the referees when this rule met with complaints. “The rules were all new to us, so it was hard to really get them down,” says De Vuyst. “Hopefully, when we hold the tournament again I would like to have a referee clinic, just so they can get better acquainted with the rules.” De Vuyst is running for VP Social for the 2008-2009 semester, and if elected he would like to see the dodgeball tournament back on a grander scale. “I would like to have more teams, and on all 3 courts, and maybe the radio station, or TV sta- tion to cover the tournament. I think it was a great sporting event and there were lots of spectators so why not put it on TV?”

Puoro courresy NUGSS.

“The Winner’s of the “Dodge Your Balls” tournament- the

Muffin Stuffers.

The UNBC women’s. team beat the Capil Blues 72-66 last w ing their record 6-0

inated the Blues in a tough phys-

finesse game was off-set by poor. timing and execution but they ed tremendous heart and dom-

yes of basketball games shows the eague their ability to. outperform

other teams in any type of match- up as their far superior stamina left _

Blues breathless by the buzzer.

el] Wallace, who’s coming off

L _a breakout 2006 season where she

Blues a in low a and the T-Wolves struge

stats as I would ha how to calculate them myself). The T-Wolves may have had an off nigh

from a shooting | perspective

¢ Blues on Seiurday, passing ‘the standings and moving

: Limportant 6® and final |

the losing end of a 79-71 nga to Capilano earlier this season, UNBC | had to win this game by 9 points

in order to pass them in the stand-

ings and reach playoff contention. p This looked all but inevitable early —

in the fourth quarter holding a 17 point lead but a shift of momentum for the Blues saw that lead drop to 7

with less than 5 minutes left in the

game causing mass panic among the

asa BCAA All-Star, CCAA Aca- <

fim: BCCA. ‘All-Star m Gladish,

Jay showed incredible poise beyond

atum for the ce

Wolves. The Blues could not recover

and the T-Wolves finished the game

inning 80-63 a full 8 points more an they needed. Gladish finished

game with a team leading 16

Laurie’s monstrous 6:

_able to come down with 9 rebounds — _and Dennis Stark’s incredible verti- cal abilities wowed the crowd wi a monumental two handed prime-

to victory again this weekend as the. team takes on first place Camosun College. Although the women have ir ae clinched a ee spot,

points. Other notable performances came by two oe as Chris |

NBC Timberwolves Northern Perfection

beating Camosun this Friday will provide tremendous momentum for the team going into the playoffs. The T-Wolves will hope to improve upon their perfect record at home, taking on, first place, Camosun Col- lege this Friday and Malaspina on Saturday. Both games start at 6. If you appreciate great basketball come out and support the T-Wolves as they take on the top team in the league and prove to the south, that ‘were just better at everything up here. Of course this is a bi-weekly

- paper so by the time your read-

ing this these games have already played out, so here are my predic- tions: on Friday the T-Wolves win

a nail biter 80-76 against Camosun,

and on Saturday the T-Wolves beat Malaspina 72-58.

din the playoff picture and will there- - — fore be looking for their 6" man to be a factor as they go up against

two 8-5 teams: Comosun College

on Friday and then Malasapina University College Saturday. Both games start at 8 so finish up your dinner and come out _to support the UNBC Timberwolves as they make their final “push into

is a bi-weekly newspaper these

games will already have Happened