NGU intramurals: what are they?
Andrew Brackett, Staff Writer
North Greenville University’s intramural program is an excellent way to find community at NGU, but what are intramurals exactly? Intramurals are competitive sports that any student, other than collegiate athletes can join. These sports range from ultimate frisbee to seven vs seven soccer.
Intramurals are a huge piece of the “North Greenville Experience” and there is most likely a sport for anyone. The sports include ultimate frisbee, seven vs seven soccer, five vs five basketball, grass volleyball, sand volleyball, video game tournaments, disc golf tournaments, flag football, pickleball, wiffleball and a nine-hole golf tournament.
The intramural season is split up between the semesters, therefore there are fall sports and spring sports. In the fall there is flag football, three vs three basketball, sand volleyball, ultimate frisbee and potentially a disc golf tournament. In the spring there is five vs five basketball, wiffleball, sand volleyball, golf tournament and pickleball.
Obviously, there are a lot of options and each sport offers a different set of rules. Although there is one rule that carries over all the sports and that is to glorify God through our sportsmanship. Coordinator for Fitness and Recreation Cam Ward said, “Sportsmanship, we grade you on a scale of one to four. Four being everyone is encouraging and the grade goes down for disrespecting the referees or the other team.”
Intramurals, while it may be competitive, an important rule is to have sportsmanship while winning or losing. Professor in sports management, Donovan Nelson, his senior seminar students last year made the intramural handbook for Ward. So, these rules are made by students for other students.
Intramurals are not only about winning or losing it’s also about being with your friends and finding a group of people anyone can play with. Intramurals’ teams vary from teams just learning the sport to previous athletes. When asked which type of team his favorite was Ward said, “I like both, the competitiveness is good, but remembering that it is just intramural sport and that you just win a t-shirt is important.”
Ward explains why intramurals are so big at NGU. He said that ever since freshman orientation week that NGU has been pushing for people to join intramurals. Ward thinks that because the school pushes so hard that’s why the school had around 900 students involved in intramurals last year. This year there are already close to three hundred participants.
Suzie Rhodes, a sophomore psychology major, shares her view of intramurals, “Intramurals are a good outlet for me because I played volleyball in high school but didn’t play in college so it’s a way for to keep doing the sport that I love with my friends.” This quote is a common theme among students, especially freshman trying to find friends. Intramural’s are the easiest place to find friends that have common interests.
Intramurals has such a wide variety of participants and sports. All games and scores are updated through an app called IMLeaugues. This app tells each team when and where their game is and who they are playing against. IMLeagues really helps keep all the games and information centralized.
Check out upcoming intramurals to find those new connections.
