Having a (broom) ball

The sport with the air of a snowball fight may be the biggest thing to sweep college campuses since streaking.

from the May 3, 2007 edition

Page 1 of 4

Mike Eruzione played his college hockey in this hallowed rink before he skated to Olympic glory at Lake Placid, netting the game-winner against the Soviets to set up a gold-medal game and a triumph for true amateurs. If there's a miracle on ice here tonight it will involve someone – anyone – not falling down and then laughing about it.

With 2:24 left in the second period, a player from the FUBs (no one seems eager to decode the acronym) swats a regulation orange ball backward from between his shoes. On the bench, his teammates – even a student coach who had looked Pat Riley-serious in his suit – erupt in laughter. Seconds later a helmeted player from Poison Ivy heads the ball, soccer-style. All seven spectators in the cavernous rink go wild.

The game is broomball, a shoes-and-sticks variation on ice hockey with the general tenor of a snowball fight – mostly convivial but with moments of cold-eyed competitiveness. The venue: Boston University's Walter Brown Arena and this week's coed intramural championships. "It has that hockey feel, but you don't have to be skilled to stand out," says Scott Nalette, the school's intramural manager. "You don't ever hear 'Wow, that's a very skilled broomball player.' "

You haven't heard of the top-seeded teams at this tournament – among them Super Tools, Team Chuck Norris, and Justice League. You probably haven't heard of this game unless you have a good-humored child at a hockey-playing school, outdoorsy friends in Minnesota, or a penchant for Canadian cultural exports.

But broomball, a helter-skelter spectacle of shuffling, shouting, and no-brakes stops, has come of age at this and more advanced levels. In 1999, eight teams – all from Minnesota – played in the adult-league national championships run by USA Broomball, the American sport's governing body, in Bloomfield, Minn. "This year we had 42 teams from nine states," says Kevin Denesen, the group's president, who estimates that 25,000 people now play in organized US leagues.

Page 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | Next Page