Everywhere you look these days, you see the electricity of sports: a deep three-pointer sinks through the basket without touching the net, or the game is put away by a devastating drive for a layup. A spectacular catch or a bruising charge between the tackles for a touchdown is the exclamation point on a football game. But this kind of electricity doesn’t belong to the NFL, or the NBA, or the NCAA Bowl Championship Series. This in fact belongs to the Intramural Sports Program at Central Oregon Community College.
The Broadside recently had the opportunity to sit down with Bill Douglass, the Director of Sports and Recreation for the 30 year old program, in order to get his view on the program, where it came from, and where it expects to go in the future.
The Intramural Sports program has been in operation for 30 years, and showcases over 20 different sports for a student to choose from, the sports varying from term to term. There are of course the usual suspects—3 vs. 3 and 5 vs. 5 basketball, flag football, softball and indoor soccer. There is also bowling, road and trail cycling, disc golf, and even a Home Run Derby available to the students as well, although Mr. Douglass said that the students are welcome to propose new ideas for recreational sports and the more competitive club sports.
“We encourage ideas from the student body in regards to new intramural sports and recreational activities,” Douglass said. “Right now, the most popular intramural sports at this time are the basketball leagues that include 16 teams for winter term. The volleyball leagues are also popular with an eight team league. And it looks like the indoor soccer league will have around six teams playing winter term.”
With all the different options available to work off stress from classes or especially from finals week, it’s plain to see that the Intramural Sports program is wildly popular among the student body. Garrett Gavlan, the coach of the COCC bodybuilding team and former member of COCC student council, echoed this sentiment.
“I see the program as supplemental to the education we receive at COCC,” Gavlan said. “It provides a place where students can grow by creating a sports club, joining a team, or entering in a fun run.”
Although, the bodybuilding team is not without its share of issues, however small that share may be. “The only hardship the program is dealing with is coming up with the funds to support so many programs,” Gavlan said when asked about any ideas he had to improve the Intramural Sports Program, “But so far the team has been dealing with it quite well by increasing fundraising and community sponsors.”
So could the student government step in to help the program deal with this hardship? The Broadside asked Mr. Gavlan if he thought ASCOCC should consider supporting the Intramural Sports program .
“It is critical that they continue funding the sports program and if they were to survey the students to justify the expenditure, I believe they would find that students do want their collected fees to support the intramural sports program,” Gavlan responded, though he was quick to ensure the Broadside that ASCOCC should not be the only entity considering increasing funds. “Although it is not just the responsibility of ASCOCC. The responsibility also lies on the college to offer the majority of the funding for the program.”