Oracle Online

Sophomore Paul Leathers has been playing for just under a year. He was taught how to play by one of the guys he roomed with in a quad in Schilling, but has since overshadowed his teacher.

“I try to play twice a week, but it lately it’s been less,” said Leathers. “You know, I hafta man up on my
game!”

He and his roommates started by going to Walker Fieldhouse and checking out racquets and balls to play.
They weren’t really sure about the rules, but after a while one of them took the initiative to look them up on the Internet, and the group slowly started to move from randomly hitting a ball to playing organized games.

Within a month, racquetball at the Fieldhouse was a regular fixture on all their calendars. Soon they bought their own racquets and were playing fast-paced, high scoring games.

“Lately I don’t play as much because I’m always playing against the same people,” said Leathers. His gripe seems to be shared by many other players on campus who just can’t find enough people to play.

“If we had some tournaments, I’d totally play,” Leathers added.

Students aren’t the only ones who use the courts. Visiting Professor Bruce Bolon has been at Hamline for four years and plays racquetball regularly. Bolon learned to play in the late 70s, when he said it was becoming more common for exercise and recreation centers to pop up. Now, Bolon has played against students from the School of Law, the CLA, and even other faculty members. He likes to play against a variety of players.

“You really have to have someone who’s about your level,” said Bolon.

He’s not picky about who he plays though, because he likes help others get into the sport. Sometimes he plays new players and switches to his off-hand to accommodate as they learn.

Bolon tries to play twice a week, and is pretty good, but by his own admission doesn’t hold a candle to
Hamline’s own resident racquetball guru, Arthur Guetter, who has been playing for 28 years.

“It’s definitely a game that can be very humbling. Art [Guetter] is incredible, I’ve played him a few times, but it’s never a challenge for him,” said Bolon.

Guetter doesn’t play at Hamline regularly, but has been known to compete with and against faculty and students. In fact, he played doubles in a tournament with Ben Herman, who graduated recently.

Guetter would like to see racquetball played more on campus. A few years back he even tried to help get a club going, but it needs a student who is willing to organize it, since he has professional duties on campus that have to come first.

“We need to get some camaraderie on campus,” Guetter said.

He realizes, as Leathers did, that it’s hard for people to find new opponents, especially since they need to be around the same skill level. Guetter believes that tournaments and clubs could help create that camaraderie on campus.

“It’s an easy sport to learn and you can play it your whole life,” he said.

So although these three white rooms sit empty and silent most of the day, from time to time, they are graced by the competitors that give them purpose. Warrior gladiators who carefully place billfolds, purses, and eyeglasses into small cubbies just right of the door. So maybe it’s not as dramatic as all that, but without these courts, dozens of students and faculty members would have to find somewhere else to play the great sport of racquetball. Many like Leathers would never learn the game, and with that loss would go the competition and friendship that it helps foster on campus.