Toss it to the Skyhawks
Bird's Ultimate Frisbee team is fifth in nation
By Joan Tupponce CONTRIBUTING WRITER

Page Dowdy/Chesterfield Observer Matt Harris (from left), Kevin Walke and Chris Wu fight for control of the Frisbee during an Ultimate Frisbee practice session.

What do you have if you combine football, soccer and basketball into one sport? The answer: an Ultimate Frisbee competition.

"You play this with a disc instead of a ball," explained Nick Ligatti, math teacher at L.C. Bird High School and volunteer coach of the Skyhawk Ultimate Club. "There is as much running (maybe more) as soccer, and the game is continuous and fast-paced like soccer. The field is approximately the same size as a football field, and once you catch the disc you must stop running, similar to picking up the dribble in basketball."

Ligatti formed the team in late 2001 and in May of 2002 the club went to its first tournament in Charlotte, N.C. Ligatti played the sport in 1992 at Monacan High School when he was a student there.

"We had a club that just got together and played," he said. "They never traveled anywhere. Currently, I play in the Greater Richmond Ultimate League, a co-ed summer league."

At the moment, the Skyhawk team is ranked fifth in the nation by the Ultimate Players Association, the governing body for the sport. There are 15 students on the A-team, which travels and plays competitively, and 15 students on a secondary B-team.

"The club is co-ed so we have one girl on the team," Ligatti said. "We have had as many as eight girls at one time. Most of the team has been playing together for at least two years."

The team generally participates in four or five tournaments a year, playing an additional three to four training games. They have played in tournaments in several cities across the country including Chattanooga, Tenn., Princeton, N.J., Pittsburgh, Washington, D.C., Williamsburg and Charlottesville. This year the team has played only high school teams. In the past, they have played college teams.

"Most colleges won't allow high schools to play in tournaments against them because they want a tougher challenge," Ligatti explained.

When it comes to challenges, the Skyhawk Ultimate Club played its toughest game this year against Groovel, a team from Atlanta.

"They had two guys on the team that played for the junior national team that won the World Junior Ultimate Championship last August," Ligatti said. "They were smart and extremely well coached. We went back and forth with them but we weren't able to stop them defensively. At halftime, we made a couple of adjustments to stop their offense, and we were able to win 15-9."

For the past three years, the team has been hosting the Sue Inge Memorial, a tournament to raise money for the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society. This year the team raised $1,500.

Even though the sport is competitive, there have been some lighthearted moments like the game the team played against the elite Paideia team from Atlanta during the 2004-05 school year.

"Our jerseys had our logo that read 'S.U.C.' for Skyhawk Ultimate Club," Ligatti recalled. "Their coach came over to me during the game and asked me if we thought we were horrible players. We all got a nice chuckle out of it when he learned what it stood for."