Newsfeed
Printer-Friendly ModeLakers in Cardinals’ sights
Team hopes to rebound after national championship loss to GVSU a season ago
September 28, 2009 —
Three years ago, Bryan Janick started a club dodgeball team that consisted of only 15 players. It would be an understatement to say that the team has turned out to be quite the surprise.
With 45 players on the roster and a runnerup national championship finish last season, the Cardinals have transformed themselves from a new club team to a perennial national power in three years. For Janick, it would have been hard envisioning this when the team began.
“When I first thought of the idea, it was more about just making a team and bringing in people that wanted to have fun,” Janick said. “Now, we have a team that goes out and expects to beat the best teams in the country.”
While there are 45 players on the team, junior Ryan Schian said the team is still looking for new players.
“People are always welcome to come to our practices and join the team,” Schian said.
“Basically, every practice is a new tryout. We take the best players from every practice and bring them to our next game.”
The team holds practices every Monday and Wednesday night from 10 a.m. to 11:30 a.m. in the Cardinal Gym.
The team enters the 2009 season full of motivation, perhaps the two biggest factors being the national championship the club hockey team won last season, along with the desire to beat Grand Valley, who defeated the Cardinals in the championship game last season.
“The fact that the club hockey team went out last season and achieved national success makes us all want to go out and get the same publicity they did,” junior Jason Stein said. “We have been so close the last couple of seasons. This is going to be the season that we do it.”
While the team squares off against opponents from all over the country, including Division 1 opponents such as Michigan State, the team that the Cardinals most want to beat still remains Grand Valley.
“They have won the national championship the last two years. To be the best, you have to beat the best, and they have been the best the last couple of seasons,” junior Spencer Jardine said.
Throughout the season, the team competes in different tournaments around the country. To pay for the travel expenses, the team holds fundraisers throughout the year, selling T-shirts and playing in exhibition games against other club teams and fraternities. Players carpool with each other to get to each destination, no matter how far away, showing the team is a tight knit group.
“We have great team camaraderie,” Schian said. “Everyone gets along with everyone, which makes some of the longer drives that we have that much more enjoyable.”
While there are no assigned positions in dodgeball, it is a sport that requires a great deal of athletic talent, along with the ability to shake off rough hits.
“I think a lot of people underestimate how rough of a sport dodgeball is,” Jardine said. “There are guys out there that throw 70 miles per hour, and head shots are legal, so you have to be able to bounce back after getting hit.”
With high expectations heading into the season, Stein is confident that this is the year the Cardinals will come out on top.
“I Guaran-stein a championship this year.”