By Ryan Martin–
As students are heading back to campus for the beginning of the spring semester, many of the extracurricular activities are starting to shape up as well. One of the more popular of these has to be intramural sports. For years, intramural sports have played a key role in getting students involved on campus in activities not related to the classroom. Whether it is basketball, bowling, indoor soccer or even a rock paper scissors tournament, intramural sports on Louisville’s campus offer a little something for everyone.
“Our goal is to get as many students involved on campus as we can,” said intramural assistant director David Hatfield, “which is why we offer such a wide range of opportunities.” Intramural sports have always had a positive impact not just on Louisville’s campus but also on campuses throughout the country. Assistant director John Smith states that there are “mountains and mountains” of data to show how much being involved in something outside the class can benefit a college student.
“When you get a student involved in something after class,” Smith said, “we’ve seen that GPAs and grades have been higher, and the performance in the classroom tends to be very good.”
These opportunities that Hatfield discusses do not just come in the form of athletic sports such as flag football and basketball. Justin Peterson, the intramural sports coordinator, emphasized the importance of getting everyone involved no matter what.
“We won’t ever turn anyone away because they weren’t a high school athlete or just couldn’t make it on a college team,” he said. “Our motto is ‘A sport for everyone and everyone to a sport,’ so intramurals don’t just apply to college athletes.” From rock paper scissors to sports trivia, there are, in fact, many types of non-athletic activities for students to get involved in on campus.
As time goes on, some sports decline and increase in popularity on campus. David Hatfield discussed these certain “fads” and predicted which sports the students are looking forward to the most.
“Obviously, with Kentucky being a basketball state, basketball tends to be our more popular sport,” Hatfield said. He also went on to discuss how popular team handball has been on campus the past couple years, as well as indoor soccer. “I can’t tell you how many times I’ve gotten requests from students about indoor soccer. However, indoor soccer is very hard to manage with the facilities that we have now.”
Hatfield also stated that he expects intramural sports to grow within the next few years, especially with the new recreation center opening on the west side of campus in 2013. According to him, these new facilities will have cinder block walls that will take all of the pounding from soccer balls, unlike the facilities we have now. However, intramural sports have certainly been on the rise over the past few years; John Smith states that the amount of intramural teams has at least doubled within the past five years.
“There was a point in time where football was only a weekend sport back before we had Parkway Field,” he said. “But now we’ve expanded that out to a full season.”
Every semester, intramurals tend to get great turnouts, and this semester is no exception. Based on information from the intramural department, it looks like we’re in for some of the biggest intramural events the campus has ever seen. All students are strongly encouraged to participate in the activities that intramurals have to offer, regardless of athletic ability. As long as students are getting involved, that’s all that matters.
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