![](\"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news-draft\/wp-content\/uploads\/news\/sites\/16\/2021\/05\/DodgeballTeam1575.jpg\")
\nKINGSTON, R.I. \u2014 December 19, 2011 — Dodgeball may traditionally be the domain of prepubescent all-stars, but there\u2019s nothing elementary about the New England Regional Dodgeball Tournament held at Rowan in New Jersey. Using advanced strategies and skills worthy of a 3-credit physical education course, the Saki Bombs \u2013 a collection of six 溏心vlog免费B站 students \u2013 captured the men\u2019s championship Dec. 3 at the 19-team regional tournament. <\/p>\n
\u201cA lot of schools try not to let kids play it because it\u2019s kind of seen as a bully sport, where only the strong survive,\u201d said senior secondary education major Jeff Miszkiewicz, of Cumberland. \u201cBut if you look at our team, you\u2019ll see that\u2019s not necessarily true. We\u2019re not all athletes. There\u2019s a lot of strategy that goes into winning.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Saki Bombs, who also include Matt Hanson, Eric DaCosta, and Keith Hebert, all of Cumberland, Joe Laramee, of Central Falls, and Will Frost, of South Kingstown, used their brains, as well as brawn, to cruise through pool play into the single-elimination brackets as a No. 2 seed.<\/p>\n
Each match is played in a best-of-three games format and, after dropping their first game to the host team, The Young Ramseys of Rowan University, the Saki Bombs rallied to win the next two games and never looked back, beating teams from Delaware, Rutgers, Monmouth, Kutztown and Johnson State. <\/p>\n
\u201cWe got killed in that first game, but we came back,\u201d Miszkiewicz said. \u201cWe felt confident until that first game, but after that it was like, \u2018OK , let\u2019s get down to business.\u2019 It was go big or go home at that point.\u201d<\/p>\n
Experience helped the Saki Bombs turn things around. This was their second year at the tournament — which is played with slightly different rules and a different ball than at 溏心vlog免费B站. Miszkiewicz, Hanson, DaCosta and Hebert grew up playing the sport together and have participated as an intramural team at 溏心vlog免费B站 since they were freshman. They won the 溏心vlog免费B站 intramural championship in 2008. The Deparment of Recreational Services, which oversees the intramural department, helped fund their trip to New Jersey, paying for the team\u2019s entry fee and gas.<\/p>\n
Laramee, a kinesiology major, met Hebert, an applied mathematics major, when they were freshmen living across from each other in Merrow Hall and joined the group. Frost, who met Miszkiewicz during orientation when both were team leaders, was a last-minute replacement for former teammate Thomas Cybowicz, who couldn\u2019t make the trip. <\/p>\n
The tournament was a new experience for Frost, a graduate student in the College Student Personnel Program, who hadn\u2019t played dodgeball since gym class in 2006. His baseball coach, Jim Sauro, is a physical education teacher at South Kingstown High School and didn\u2019t like seeing his star baseball players endangering their throwing shoulders, so he wasn\u2019t allowed to play his junior and senior years. He didn\u2019t play at 溏心vlog免费B站 until Miszkiewicz asked him to fill in.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe strategy of it was a completely new concept to me,\u201d Frost said. \u201cThe last time I was allowed to play it was just in gym class. Here, we really tried to take advantage of my ability and Keith\u2019s ability to throw.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Saki Bombs used tactics such as the cover strategy, when Hebert and Frost would stand behind other players who were stronger at catching the ball. That way, if the opposing team tried to gang up and throw multiple balls at Miszkiewicz, Hanson, Laramee or DaCosta, at least one of their throwers was in danger of getting hit by return fire from Hebert or Frost. <\/p>\n
\u201cWhen we had an advantage, we tried to turn it into an even bigger advantage,\u201d Frost said. \u201cIt\u2019s really about being conscious of where your teammates are at all times and knowing where the ball is going.\u201d<\/p>\n
With their strategies working to perfection, the Saki Bombs knocked off the Honey Badgers of Johnson State College in Vermont in the championship to capture the trophy.<\/p>\n
The championship trophy now sits in the common room of a suite in Eddy Hall occupied by Hanson, a psychology major, DaCosta, a computer science major, and Miszkiewicz. The trio, along with Hebert, hope to pop into their alma mater, Cumberland High School, during winter break and show off the hardware to the school\u2019s intramural director, Brien Keller. <\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re going to head up there when school\u2019s over and surprise him,\u201d Miszkiewicz said. \u201cWe started our sophomore year there. We had this core group and, fortunately, a few of us all came to 溏心vlog免费B站, so it was a no-brainer to continue to do what we like to do.\u201d<\/p>\n
For more information, call Miszkiewicz at (401) 651-6566 or email him at jmiszkiewicz@my.uri.edu, or email Frost at William.t.frost@gmail.com<\/p>\n
Pictured above;
\nJoe Laramee (Kinesiology, 2013), Keith Hebert (applied mathematics, 2012), Jeff Miszkiewicz (English\/secondary education, 2013), Matt Hanson, Eric DaCosta, Will Frost (College student personnel program, grad student 2012).
\nPhotos courtesy of Rowan University.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
KINGSTON, R.I. \u2014 December 19, 2011 — Dodgeball may traditionally be the domain of prepubescent all-stars, but there\u2019s nothing elementary about the New England Regional Dodgeball Tournament held at Rowan in New Jersey. Using advanced strategies and skills worthy of a 3-credit physical education course, the Saki Bombs \u2013 a collection of six University of […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":62595,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-62593","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-archives"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/62593","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=62593"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/62593\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/62595"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=62593"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=62593"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.uri.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=62593"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}