Whether it be fact or fiction, brooms have the ability to play a role in many different sports. There is Quidditch, a fictional sport from J. K. Rowling’s “Harry Potter” where people fly around on magic brooms and swat cannonballs at each other, which, when Muggles play, is called quadball. There’s curling, where competitors use brooms to propel stones down ice towards a target area. Then there’s Broomball. Turns out “many different sports,” is just three.
Broomball is a mostly casual sport played on ice where players split into two teams and use ‘brooms,’ which are really just the broom handle with a plastic wedge, to score goals with a small, soccer-ball-esque ball in hockey goals. The main gimmick is that players wear their regular shoes.
The LASA Latin Club does a yearly fundraiser hosting a school-wide game of Broomball. Senior Wyatt Fenton has played at that fundraiser for the past three years.
“It’s really fun to play because you basically just have a bunch of people running around on ice with tennis shoes and smacking the ball with sticks,” Fenton said. “It’s a great LASA experience.”
This annual tradition occurs after midterms at Chaparral Icel. Mila Hawkins is the Camps and Events Director for Chaparral Ice, a local rink that usually hosts ice skating or hockey events and opportunities.
“A lot of people just don’t know about Broomball: they don’t know it exists; they don’t know exactly what it is,” Hawkins said. “I honestly don’t know how the kids at LASA know about it.”
This tradition has been going on for decades, starting several years before former Latin teacher, Byron Browne, started teaching at LASA and LBJ in 1997. Though the event is only hosted by Latin these days, it used to be a joint fundraiser for all eight language programs.
“It was really just a way to get the disparate language students together at a singular event just to hang out and have fun,” Browne said. “So, when I became the Latin teacher, I continued to do that. And, from what I could see, the event just grew and grew, more and more people, I guess word of mouth. You know, like it’s fun, it’s a nice thing to do on a Saturday night, and that was it.”
Over time, the other language teachers gradually stopped attending, leaving the event under the care of Browne. As a result, Broomball became a signature event of the Latin Club.
“I delegated the task of calling Chaparral Ice to the Latin Club Officers, just to give them a responsibility,” Browne said. “And then to print the fliers, and there’s always permission slips involved with Chaparral Ice. And, collecting the money and paying Chaparral Ice.”
Due to increasing prices, Broomball stopped being a fundraiser. It became just a get-together for LASA students, and only continued due to its popularity within the student community, despite challenges for Latin Club as Chaparral’s prices rose.
“We stopped being a fundraiser. We were just covering our costs to pay Chapparal,” Browne said. “They raised their price from one year to the next. I remember thinking that ‘wow this is over.’ But, the students were still so interested in doing the thing, that the increased price wasn’t a problem.”
Latin Club officers take on many responsibilities to allow this tradition to continue. Keila Hays, the current Latin teacher and Latin Club sponsor, delegates to the officers.
“The kids are amazing, and they do so much work such as emailing and calling the ice rink to schedule Broomball, making the posters, making the flyers, raising awareness,” Hays said. “I mostly just collect the money, and then get the check to bring the ice rink right before the event.”
This year’s match had around 30 participants, about the same number as last year, according to Hays. Prices for playing Broomball increased from $15 to $20 this year to allow Latin Club to raise essential funds, as Hays explained.
“We made back the money that it cost to rent the ice rink, and then we made that back again,” Hays said. “I want to thank everyone who isn’t a part of Latin club and isn’t in Latin who comes out to Broomball and helps us fundraise, and raise money for us to go to our competitions.”
Even as fundraising becomes more of a focus, the goal to provide a bonding experience among all LASA students, not just one language or organization, succeeds.
“I don’t recognize so many of the students,” Hays said. “And it’s really great that we get such a reach into kids that I don’t even know.”
This tradition only has lasted this long because of the continued dedication and interest of Latin Club and LASA students alike, as Browne highlighted. Even as prices rose and teachers grew tired of staying up past midnight, LASA students still wanted to run around the ice on their sneakers every year.
“Through the fall semester of almost every year,” Browne said. “I would have students from other language classes come to my room asking about Broomball … I’d never seen them, I didn’t know their names, but they would come and they would ask me ‘are we doing Broomball this year?’ So the interest from the students never waned. It never decreased, it only increased.”
