On Saturday, Feb. 11th, the Department of Campus Sports and Recreation will be hosting a team-based battleship tournament in the pool of the John W. Hart Building from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m.
Each four-player team will be placed in a boat. Up to 10 teams will compete at the same time in a heat, depending on how many boats are available. Teams will get points for what place they come in, within their heat.
According to Ryan Hansen, one of the competitive sports advisors at BYU-Idaho, each team will participate in three heats. The teams with the most points will advance to the semifinals or the championship. The creation of the semifinals will depend on how many teams register for the event.
Those who are interested can register for the event here.
Each team is allowed a combination of four buckets or shields. Each person is allowed to hold one at a time.
The winning team will receive hats and championship T-shirts alongside an assortment of rubber ducks and chocolate coins.
This will be the 20th year that a battleship event takes place at BYU-I. According to Hansen, the sport originated in Rexburg in 2004.
“If you Google intramural battleship … you’ll see tons of different schools and universities across the entire nation that are playing intermural battleship,” Hansen said. “We actually started it on our campus here at BYU-Idaho in 2004. It’s something that we’re proud of.”
“We’ve got a swimming pool that is often underutilized and boats sitting around from the ROC, and nobody’s using canoes in the winter here,” Hansen said. “How can we get people in to be able to play or use our facilities who aren’t our traditional athletes?”
Hansen went on to mention the inclusivity of the event.
“That’s one of the nice things about battleship,” Hansen said. “You don’t need to be a tall basketball player or a strong whatever to be able to do it. You throw a bucket of water at another group of people and have fun.”
Tess Washburn, a 2022 battleship participant, agreed.
“It was super fun,” Washburn said. “I liked that it was something unique that I had never tried before. Everyone there was having a lot of fun and really got into it.”