House Street Hockey to Break the Ice

Warm weather won't have to darken the spirits of Harvard hockey fanatics this spring. There will be an intramural street hockey tournament in April, giving weakankled would-be hockey stars a chance to show their stuff.

The experimental tournament represents the larger efforts of the House athletic secretaries to increase participation in intramural athletics by including more non-varsity sports. Volleyball attracted some 400 participants this winter, and ping-pong and bicycle racing may be added to the program later this Spring.

The tournament was jointly proposed by Tom Volpe and Don Crim, athletic secretaries of Mather and Kirkland Houses respectively, who said that there was considerable interest in street hockey in their Houses.

Hockey Crazed

Volpe said that "a lot of students are not exposed to hockey until they come to Harvard, in hockey-crazed Boston, where they fall in love with the sport. They can't skate, so they dig playing street hockey."

He said that street hockey is second in popularity only to basketball in Mather House, and that many players have expressed the desire to compete on a more organized basis against other Houses.

Crim said that he expects street hockey to be even more popular as the weather improves.

Floyd Wilson, director of Intramural Athletics, said that interest in intramural athletics has been shifting due to the influx of women in Harvard Houses. He said that the women have helped to neutralize the traditional athletic competition between Houses.

Wilson said that "more and more people just want to play games and don't care about prizes. This is what intramurals is all about."

The tentative location for the street hockey games is the parking lot behind Mather House.