On Thursday, February 20th, and Friday, February 21st, Manitou Springs High School (MSHS) held a dodgeball tournament to raise funds to go towards former Manitou teacher Nick Noland. This year, things were a little different than the other annual dodgeball tournaments. Instead of having held the tournament in the evening after school and work hours, it was held during advisory on two separate days. Advisory is like a homeroom or a mini study hall, holding not a huge deal of significance. Although, during this time, some students can find it useful, so each student was offered to either go and watch the tournament in the new or old gyms or to do normal advisory time, except in the Media Center. Even with attending the tournament being optional, it didn’t seem like too many students wanted to go and do work in the Media Center, the stands were full of students and teachers.

With everything already having a little twist to it, the first dodgeball team, The Stone, was up against five Manitou Springs police officers and firefighters. Those that were on this team were Joey Allen (12), Grayson Bodor (12), Jez Sommers (12), Riley Jungbauer (12), Sumari Bowen (12), Rashaun Booker (12), Aniah Olson (12) and Grace Allen (9). Originally in these tournaments, each team is made up of MSHS students, but this year’s style was intended to be switched up to make the week even more exciting.

These grown officers seemed intimidating at first but ended up losing to The Stone. This group kept defeating teams, even into Friday, winning the championship altogether. This team even had to have a player switched out, and still remained the champs, as Olson couldn’t make the championship on Friday. Alexia Vigil (10) was kind enough to fill her spot and she played with her best efforts. This switch out needed to be very particular though, each team needed at least two females on their teams, so they couldn’t just swap out for any random student.

This tournament was a great opportunity to make advisory not so boring, while students were able to bond, whether they were on the court or in the stands. It also was a good way to making the school day not so hard to go through and school in general not all that sucky. The winning team, The Stone, was rewarded with a box of donuts to conclude this year’s dodgeball tournament.