Late night olympics becomes tradition
By JOHN FANNING
News Writer
As a result of the efforts of RecSports, the 16th Annual Late Night Olympics will take place tonight at the Joyce Center from 7 p.m. - 4 a.m. The event has become tradition and allows between 1,300 and 1,500 students to participate in 18 different events that make use of all of the facilities that the Joyce Center offers.
Late Night Olympics serves as a source of charity for the St. Joseph County chapter of the Special Olympics, donating between $4,500 and $4,700 through the event each year.
According to Kara O'Leary, the assistant director of RecSports and coordinator of the event, "students get very excited about LNO, and its popularity has really allowed RecSports to build a tradition out of the event."
There are many standard sports such as basketball, soccer, and football, along with several out of the ordinary, such as monster dodgeball, innertube water polo and broomball, a popular game similar to hockey but without the skates.
Before the event campus is divided into 13 teams, pairing male and female dorms from Notre Dame, Saint Mary's and Holy Cross.
LNO is open to anyone who registers in advance with his or her dorm. Students are asked to make a $1 donation at the door.
Those students planning to participate in the open skate from 10 p.m. to midnight, which does not require prior sign-up, will be charged $2.
LNO began 16 years ago as a spin-off of an event held at the University of Indiana called "The Spirit of Sport All-Nighter." It started in an effort to allow students to get out and have some fun during the dreary South Bend winter and the event quickly became popular.
It was not until later that the event became a fundraiser for the Special Olympics. Since then both attendance and donations have gradually increased as the event has become more and more popular.
Peter Kenny, a junior who participated in LNO for the last two years, said, "The Late Night Olympics is a great event that provides some variety into a student's social life. The little medals they handout are cool too."
"Students get extremely competitive about the events," said O'Leary.
"They bring lots of spectators, and some even run around carrying flags. They treat it like it's the real Olympics."
There is motivation behind this mayhem, however. Every year the Alumni Association donates money so that the winners of each event may receive gold medals, while the dorm team who wins the most events overall has their name engraved on a trophy and they reign as the LNO champions until the following year.
Though the event schedule has not changed since last year, one addition to this year's event is the Penny War.
Each team has a jug in Rolfs that will be moved to the Joyce Center on the night of the event.
Team members can put pennies or dollars into these jugs to give their team extra points, while any silver coins that they put in the other teams' bins will detract from their point total.
Though this adds an even greater sense of competition to the event and will be a great help in the fundraising, O'Leary warns that the LNO champions will not be determined until all of the money has been counted, which may take until Monday or Tuesday.
However, she feels that the extra money to be donated will definitely be worth the wait.
Kicking off the event at 9 p.m. is the Special Olympics basketball game.
Each year the best Special Olympians from the South Bend area come to LNO for a basketball game against the faculty.
"It is a nice way for the staff and students to get a feel for the charitable aspect of the event," said O'Leary. "And the faculty loses every year."
Students who come as spectators may also enter in a raffle for prizes donated by local businesses.
The tickets are two for $1 and O'Leary encourages the students to "come with a little bit of cash", as these proceeds will go to charity as well.
All News Stories for Friday, January 25, 2002
