Freshmen sometimes have a tough time finding what to do with all the freedom and new found free time on their hands, but with intramural and club sports just a few clicks away, it hasn’t been easier.
Through the Slippery Rock imleagues.com page, students can sign up for club and intramural sports with currently 24 options for club teams and countless opations for intramural sports. Club teams can range from baseball, to ice hockey, or golf, and even martial arts. Although the sports are not part of the university’s Division II programs, the competitiveness of these sports are still over the top.
“Club is very competitive,” assistant director of recreational sports Matthew Lobaugh said. “Then when it comes to intramural sports, we offer two different leagues. One is a t-shirt league, which is recreational, and the other one is mug, where if you win you actually get a mug, and thats a competitive league.”
Lobaugh and his staff make it a top priority to reach out to freshmen each year because as he explained, if students have a good time their freshmen year, they are more likely to come back the following years.
“I think we try to reach out to every student,” Lobaugh said. “Trying to partner and trying to get the word out that hey, we do offer intramural sports, but we have a lot of options when it comes to intramural sports.
Then their are other ways students can get involved through officiating games or running the scoreboards. This can also lead to students applying for supervisor, which oversees the entire intramural program, Lobaugh explained.
“Say I’m not here, they’re in charge of the whole program,” Lobaugh said. “What that does is they’re college students, they’re here to be empowered, they’re here to go graduate. Once they get a job, they should leave here knowing how to manage a team, how to manage certain situations, how to handle conflict, and if I’m doing it all for them, thats not going to get it done in the real world.”
Women’s lacrosse club captain Lindsi Gamble feels it is very important for student to get involved, and knowing that students have options when it comes to these sports.
“I think its important because whenever I was a freshman, I didn’t know much about the clubs and organizations and then I finally did and it was a great way to make friends and just gain experience on leadership abilities,” Gamble said.
The number of sports varies from fall to spring and after spring break, a new club team will be hosting tryouts for men’s basketball. Intramural sports is a little bit different than club teams, as they serve as organized pick-up games from a variety of sports and games such as dodgeball, flag football, kickball, and ultimate frisbee.
Pickup games like these are designed to get the average student to get involved with sports and keep a healthy lifestyle in college, while also keeping up with their school work, Lobaugh mentioned.
“Studies have shown that just coming down to ‘The Arc’ in general whether its intramural, lifting, or any other recreational activity, studies have proven that student have better grades,” Lobaugh said.
For the 2018 spring semester, registration deadlines for many intramural sports are coming up on March 21. with inline hockey, while dodgeball, kickball, three on three volleyball, futile, and four on four flag football have a March 29. deadline. Badminton tournament registration ends April 4. and the ultimate frisbee tournament registration ends April 18. Students can register at imleagues.com/sru.
