Combine a healthy dose of fitness, a splash of camaraderie, and a few scoops of intense competition. What does that make?
Intramural sports.
Baker’s fall intramurals season is scheduled to kick off Sunday with a kickball tournament located at the softball fields behind Gessner Hall.
Flag football has also been organized to begin that day, but with only three teams signed up, intramurals director Silas Dulan worries that the four week schedule of play might not turn out as well as it has in years past.
“I understand the fall sports are usually touch and go because a lot of fall athletes are doing their sports and coaches don’t want them out there twisting an ankle or breaking an arm,” Dulan said, “but we usually get around 10 to 15 teams for flag football and we’d like to have that many again this year.”
Because of the lack of entrants thus far, Dulan has extended the due date for team sign-ups to Wednesday at 4 p.m.
Intramurals is open to all students and faculty with a valid Baker ID and they are able to sign up by one of three ways: picking up a flier at the intramurals bulletin board on the main floor of the union, submitting a roster online or visiting Dulan in his office on the second floor of the union.
For senior Hayes Farwell, there is no question whether or not he will participating in the games this year, as intramurals have been a prevalent and entertaining aspect of his past three years at Baker.
“I really enjoy playing with my pals, but winning the championship T-shirts doesn’t make me or my closet mad either,” Farwell said.
The T-shirts he spoke of are a “prized possession” among intramurals competitors, Dulan said.
Farwell has been able to receive numerous coveted intramurals T-shirts, as he has helped take his team to the finals in many of the leagues including flag football, indoor soccer, and 5 vs. 5 basketball which marks his most memorable moment of playing intramurals.
“During my sophomore year, our (5 vs. 5) basketball team went undefeated,” Farwell said. “We had a really fun time celebrating our 15-0 season.”
Dulan hopes the rest of the Baker community will catch on to a hype of intramurals similar to Farwell’s, as he sets goals for the future of the program including the possibility of attending national tournaments.
“Intramurals on a larger scale has a lot of recognition, so I would like to get some teams together who could be serious about competing, I think that would be pretty neat to put us on the map,” Dulan said. “I also would like to see more faculty and staff involved to build a better rapport with students.”
As for now, Dulan will focus on regaining involvement from all of Baker to get this intramurals season started off right.
Indoor soccer will also be included in the fall intramurals schedule, but it isn’t set to start until Monday, Nov. 5. Tennis, 5-on-5 and 3-on-3 basketball, and Baker’s intramural volleyball league will begin next semester.
