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Time for change

Wildcat File Photo Arizona Daily Wildcat Joshua Mcclain

Intramurals to take top billing on the sports page - what should this headline mean to you?

Pure joy, because it's about time the newspaper community faces up to some hard truths.

Intramurals are simply the greatest aspect at the UA. Where else is competition such a vital part? How else can I get a workout and have some fun at it?

If only we could get Lee Corso out there to check out some games, it could be proven that football can be played in high quality somewhere other than the East Coast.

So, why bother covering all of those NCAA sports, let's get the sports page covering the unsung athletic warriors in Tucson - intramural sports athletes.

Why cover basketball? They win the Pac-10 every year anyways.

Softball? Come on, they win the National championship every other year. That's old news.

No longer will students' Saturday nights be filled with Tomey's running plays. Spend that time partying, because the real football happens every night-at the intramural sports field.

How about we fill up this page with sports stars who aren't guaranteed a big pay-day after graduation? And it shouldn't be limited to football, although it is the most popular intramural sport.

Let's see some features on who has some mad skills on the soccer field or the dominant shot blocker in the desert basketball league.

This potential program has a huge upside for all involved.

In a recent survey of 331 schools published by "The Princeton Review," the UA was ranked the No. 1 jock school in the nation. One of the main factors of this ranking is the percentage of students who participate in intramurals.

According to the data, 6,000 of UA's finest play intramural sports each season. For those of you that aren't exactly mathematically inclined, that's just under 20 percent. One in four students participate in this campus activity, much more than NCAA-regulated sports.

The motto for the Campus Recreation, the foster parent for intramural sports is "Everyone wins when we play together."

How can you not support an organization with that kind of motto?

This has an obvious benefit for the participants as well. Students will relish seeing themselves in print the next morning after scoring a few goals in a stunning field hockey match or booting a home run in kickball the previous evening.

This is a program that doesn't have team names like Lions and Bears, but precious team names like "High Rollers" and "Nitty Jimmies."

Let us change the way we cover sports and talk about the diamonds in the rough, the denizens of the intramural sports world.

Fight the good fight and we can win. See you on the field.