Beneath the glamour and national headlines of varsity collegiate competition lies another level of athletic endeavor where students who can't cover 40 yards in 4.4 seconds or hit the pull-up jumper in traffic can still aspire to playing-field heroics.
Each year, more than 6,000 students participate in 29 intramural and 20 club sports. Basketball, both men's and women's, is by far the most popular of intramurals, filling up the Recplex courts every night from November to February. A story in Boston College Magazine described this brand of roundball: "Intramurals is basketball at its most basic: a shirts-and-skins affair, where, to paraphrase the student newspaper, 130-pound guards talk trash to 220-pound centers. In this league, team defense means that when a guy drives to the hoop, three or more opponents may greet him with warm hugs."