Fantasy Tournaments Part 1: Midwest, Mid-Atlantic, South, and Canada
Last summer was the beginning of a new trend in qu...
Photo by Deanna Edmunds
The Southwest region hosted the first fantasy tournament in Austin, Texas last July. About 75 players participated in the event - organized by Kody Marshall of the University of Texas Austin (Austin, TX) - from teams such as Roadrunner Quidditch (San Antonio, TX), Tufts University (Medford, MA), and the Lost Boys (Lomita, CA). The tournament's success led to the formation of similar tournaments throughout the rest of summer 2012. Steve DiCarlo, currently of the Lost Boys, organized a Northeast Tournament. Logan Anbinder, the IQA's Marketing Director and former Mid-Atlantic Regional Director who is currently playing for the Silicon Valley Skrewts (Mountain View, CA), put together a draft for the Mid-Atlantic.
Although the World Cup was held not even a month ago, the summer quidditch ‘season' is already shaping up nicely. New fantasy drafts, inspired by the success of last year's ventures, are already planned, and every North American region has a tournament currently being organized.
Tournament structures vary slightly, but they generally follow the same sort of format: players sign up via Google Docs, submitting personal information, quidditch stats, or a mixture of the two. Come tournament time, preselected general managers, who essentially act as coaches, make bids on players to draft their fantasy team. Several regions have chosen in the past – and are choosing again this summer – to use these tournaments as an opportunity to offer snitch and referee certification. The first half of this summer will feature tournaments from the Midwest, Mid-Atlantic, South, and Canada.
Planned for June 15th in Chicago, IL, Midwest Fantasy Tournament 2013 will be the first regional draft tournament of the summer. Player registration is $13, which will help cover field fees and t-shirts for the teams. McLaren Cundiff of Purdue University (West Lafayette, IN) is one of the organizers. According to Cundiff, this year's venture will be very similar to last year's, but it will be much larger since there are already over 130 players signed up, compared to last year's roster of 56. The 2012 Midwest Fantasy Quidditch tournament, which was held on the Ohio State University (Columbus, OH) campus, featured a lot of players from the Great Lakes Conference. A few players from outside regions participated - such as David Moyer of the University of Miami (Coral Gables, FL) - but the general bulk of attendees came from the Midwest. “Regular tournaments are grueling,” Cundiff stated. “Even when you're resting, you're thinking about your next game, or you're thinking about things that went wrong in the match you just played. You work with the same group of people for weeks and months in order to play together like a well-oiled machine. Fantasy tournaments, on the other hand, are for fun. If you win, great!”
Although the Mid-Atlantic Region has partnered with the Carolina Quidditch Conference for a second regional tournament on July 20th, they have also recently announced a draft for June 29th. Entitled the Mid-Atlantic Region End of Season Fantasy Tournament, this is a draft to celebrate both the official end to the quidditch season and the beginning of a new one. Alex Krall, Mid-Atlantic Regional Director, is an organizer for both tournaments. “[Well,] last year the fantasy was held in [Maryland], which is fairly central to the region,” said Krall. “[This] year there was a lot of support to hold a tournament south from [players in North Carolina] and teams bordering in [South Carolina and Tennessee]. So we decided to have two to provide this playing opportunity for the more southern-based quidkids as well as the upper part of the region. In addition, we wanted to use this event to highlight reflection on IQA Season 2012-2013, and to get people excited for the following one, since the new season starts at a time when many quidkids are not with their teams.” The first Mid-Atlantic fantasy draft will be held in Stoever's Dam Park in Lebanon, PA, and there will be a $10 registration fee per player.
The Canada Day Fantasy Tournament will be held on the 30th of June. Jamie Lafrance, a keeper for the University of Ottawa (Ottawa, ON) and one of the official organizers for Canada's first fantasy draft, knew he was interested in establishing a tournament after he went to the one hosted last year by the Northeast region. “I really love these tournaments and what they bring to the community. It gets people together without relying on the team to go to a tournament where friends' teams will be. It also makes you play with new people,” said Lafrance. Although this is to be Ottawa's first fantasy tournament, Lafrance is confident in his team of organizers' ability to run a tournament smoothly: “[This year] we had the honor of having [Tegan Bridge, Canada's Regional Director] on [UOttawa;] this was good because you really learn a lot of the behind the scenes of how to run things. At the Canadian Cup we had [EMTs] right on the spot, ready to go…Things like this help you plan [for] what you need.”
Lafrance is certain that Canadian players will be enthusiastic about attending their first fantasy tournament, and he hopes that scheduling the draft the day before Canada Day will inspire a sense of nationality in his fellow quidditch-playing countrymen. The organizers of the Canada Day Fantasy Tournament will soon be making a housing form available via Google Docs to offer shelter to out-of-towners, which should likely tempt some of the more far-flung players interested in attending. There will also quite possibly be RDT (Referee Development Team) training at this tournament. There will be a $5 registration fee per player.
Although the South has a tournament planned for July 13th, organized by Tabitha Yousko of Florida State Quidditch (Tallahassee, FL), it was a long time coming. It was late May before the South region had established its fantasy tournament despite that many players were quite vocal about their desire to establish one for summer 2013. Prior to the organization of FSU's tournament, several people acknowledged the difficulties in organizing an event for such a big area. “With a large concentration of teams in Florida, location is a difficult factor, as the events will always be inconvenient for some teams,” said Nick Battelini of the University of South Carolina (Columbia, SC). Battelini is responsible for the formation of a Facebook page entitled ‘South Region Summer Quidditch' that strives to keep an up-to-date list of tournaments and events being held this summer in the region.
“The South is one of the biggest regions in the IQA, and one of the least team-dense,” concurred Dan Miller of Ringling College of Art and Design (Sarasota, FL). “In the earlier days of the South, the only teams were located in Florida…After a disappointing showing at [the] World Cup, the [Florida Quidditch Conference] has had to come to terms with the fact that we can't do it alone. This summer is the start of that.” Yousko agreed that much of the difficulty in forming a regional tournament for the South has lain in successfully determining a location that would appease mostly everyone. “A fantasy tournament held in Tallahassee (as [a] more geographic middle-ground) gives us a chance to branch out and draw players from throughout the region,” Yousko explained. The event, officially titled the Southern Regional Area Fantasy Tournament, will be held at the FSU Rec Sports Complex in Tallahassee, FL; it will be the South's first regional draft. Although not very much has been decided yet, the tournament organizers have made it clear that they, like Canada, are offering housing to as many out-of-town players as possible.
