Ultimate frisbee is quickly becoming a sport of the masses on college campuses across the nation.
On the Puget Sound campus there is a close following due to the recent success of our club team.
With two first-place regional finishes and a second place finish at the Division III national tournament, support quickly turned into passion for the game on the Logger campus.
Connecting through Twitter and Facebook keeps the campus widely in tune with the team, unlike most teams here on campus.
Even though the sport is becoming popular, the rules of ultimate frisbee make for a complicated game. The field that teams play on is 120 yards long and about 40 yards wide, with the length including a 20-yard end zone on either end of the field. There are seven players on the field per team and substitutes are allowed during injury timeouts and between points.
To begin the game, two teams start in their respective end zones and one team throws the disc down the field to the other, much like a kickoff in football. Once the disc is in play, it can only be moved by passing, and the player handling the disc may not move except to pivot on one foot. If a player on the offensive team catches the disc in the end zone, their team scores a point. After a team scores, they throw off to the other team, going in the opposite direction from the last point.
If a disc is dropped, missed or intercepted by the opposing team or received out of bounds, the other team gains possession from the spot where the pass was dropped or intercepted, or from the closest spot to where the disc went out of bounds.
The other way that a disc changes hands is when a player handling the disc holds the disc for 10 stall counts. A stall count can only be initiated if the defending player is within 10 feet of the thrower; the defending player then counts in an audible voice to 10 and if the thrower fails to throw the disc in 10 seconds, the disc is turned over to the other team. The game is played until a determined time limit or when one team reaches a certain total of points.
The Loggers have ended the past two seasons as the number one ranked team despite losing two straight finals. The recent success comes from the strong leadership in the team. The current captain of the team is Daniel Mozell and he points to other supporting players, two of whom are senior Dylan Harrington and sophomore Reily Carpenter, as taking central roles in leading the team.
Harrington has become a central asset to the team’s downfield offense after joining the team from playing soccer. Carpenter, an ultimate player from the beginning, has become the rock holding the defense together for the Loggers. Even with such strong leadership, the team looks forward to adding essential players back into their roster come spring.
Mozell’s partner in captaincy, Alan Henzy, returns from abroad in the spring along with Jack Derham to strengthen the already solid Logger ultimate frisbee team.
