The ASU Student Alumni Association’s 31st annual Oozeball Tournament brought mud, sun and fun to Alpha Drive on the Tempe campus.
Teams gathered on a hot Saturday afternoon for some messy competition, loud music and charity. The SAA hosted 28 teams, comprised of ASU students as well as high school students, alumni and students' families.
Nicole Evans, one of the event coordinators, said many participants did not know what oozeball was before signing up for it.
Oozeball is essentially mud volleyball, only a little more laid back.
“We don’t have traditional volleyball rules,” Evans said. “We’re a lot more casual because some people don’t play volleyball on a rec team or have never known the formal rules.”
Players stand on a court, which is a plot of carved out of the field, filled with a large amount of mud and water.
“We use some volleyball standards like boundary lines, serving, stuff like that,” Evans added. “We just don’t make it super stringent so people who have never played before aren’t confused or uncomfortable.”
Molecular bioscience major Rebekah Dickey, a participant at the event, called the sport a “free for all.” The mud makes the competition interesting; some players do better in the mud while others struggle, Dickey said.
For some, the event is a family affair. Evans said some participants bring their high school siblings to give them a taste of ASU life.
Senior Nicole Schmidt found out about the event through advertisements last year and played in this year’s tournament with her sister, sophomore Amber Schmidt. Nicole said she enjoys the event because she can get out and be active in the mud.
The teams tend to be creative with the names such as “How I Met Your Mudder” and “Going Up on a Oozeday,” which is one of the best aspects of the event, Evans said.
In addition to the fun, the tournament also gave back. Participants paid $18 to take part in the event, and this year, the tournament gave a portion of the proceeds to United Way.
United Way is a nonprofit organization that finds issues in a community and works to fix them. It focuses on improving areas of health, income and education.
“The Student Alumni Association chose to create a tradition of supporting charities during oozeball after sponsoring United Way during Devils in Disguise 2014,” Evans said. “It’s very rewarding to be responsible for an event that brings fun and philanthropy to the community. I would not want it any other way.”
Planning for the event was extensive and lengthy. Evans said the planning team had been working on the event since November in order to schedule the disc jockey and food.
The alumni team “Mud Slingers” walked away as the mud-covered winners of the event and took home the coveted Oozeball Tournament Trophy.
Reach the reporter at gabrielle.c.abbott@asu.edu or follow @gabbyc_abbott on Twitter.
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