Pick-up sports
Lack of sports courts, less fun for everyone

Lets talk about sports - specifically, non-varsity and non-club sports.

Why aren't there any outdoor basketball goals on campus, or anywhere near campus? Ed Board longs for one measly hoop that's not the testosterone-scented territory of a fraternity (confederate flags mess up your free-throw percentage, anyway). Even one of those eight-foot, rusty hoops that hangs at an angle would suffice. You know - the ones that kids pretend to dunk on when battling out brutally violent (no blood = no foul), after-school, one-on-one games. Stick a busted-up backboard on the side of a building and Ed Board will play after everybody goes home and the parking lots are miraculously empty.

But, sadly, this dream probably won't come true. SMU is way too image-conscious to allow an eyesore like a pick-up game to happen outside the gym and in the public eye. And anyway, access to outdoor courts wouldn't be restricted, and nobody would want "the wrong element" congregating like hoodlums in such an elevated neighborhood.

Certainly there's nothing wrong with having tennis courts available on campus. That's a nice, clean, no contact sport where groups of two or four respectable kids can work up a healthy sweat.

Soccer presents another difficulty. If you want to work on your penalty kick, you either have to scale the intramural field fence (watch out for those spikes) or hope no one catches you on Westcott Field because they will chew you out for tearing up the grass. The alternative would be to submit to schedules and stinky red jerseys by joining some intramural team. Ed Board has no complaints about intramurals - they're fun and promote an active and inclusive university community.

However, it's a riot that bowling is such a popular intramural. The reason reveals itself immediately at the alley - it's the only intramural where alcohol can be purchased, and it doesn't require any strenuous moving about. Drunk people have a tough time coordinating a spike and set, but rolling a ball in the direction that the little arrows point is generally not a problem.

Although, those balls are awfully heavy, and the clown shoes do have really slick bottoms ...