We’re bringing rocketball and powderpuff back.

Students at BE want to bring rocketball and powderpuff back in the spring.

Powderpuff and rocketball are two sports that are played during the football homecoming week. Many students enjoyed them so much that they want the sports to be played again in the spring. Whether or not these sports can be played later on in the year is up in the air.

Rocketball is where a team of males play a volleyball games and powderpuff is when a team of females play a game of flag football. Both of these are very popular activities among students.

Powderpuff currently plays one game per team. The sophomores play the freshman and the juniors play the seniors. The teams face off in four twelve minute quarters. This year, the juniors beat the seniors and the freshman bet the sophomores. However, since this was not tournament style the winning teams and losing teams did not face off against each other.

Maggie Green was one of many students who enjoyed playing powderpuff. She enjoyed “getting to compete with my class and against some of my other upperclassmen friends,”

“From what I see, there is no doubt that the majority who participate do enjoy it. Again, the chance to compete together as a class group makes it that way and I think that everyone enjoys getting the team apparel.” said powderpuff sponsor, Lenny Raley.

Many groups of students benefit from this event. “Powderpuff is also used as a fundraising event. Currently, our cross country teams and girls basketball team is in charge of the event. The band takes care of the concessions. So, we all benefit monetarily from this night,” said Raley.

Rocketball started when a group of boys approached homecoming sponsor, Momma Jo Perkins and asked if they could do they event. Since the girls already had powderpuff, they thought that they should have an activity for the guys. Bullitt East Alumni Keenan Ciskhe was credited naming the sport “rocketball.”

Rocketball plays tournament style and the winner of the tournament had the opportunity to play a team of teachers. The freshman and sophomores played first, then the juniors and the seniors. In this year’s game the winners, sophomores and seniors, played each other and the losers, the juniors and freshmen, played each other. The seniors won the tournament and played the teachers at the pep rally on Sep 22. The seniors defeated the teachers during the third set at the rally.

Students in the past have greatly enjoyed playing rocketball. “The boys have absolutely loved playing every year. They enjoy dressing in crazy outfits. We’ve seen everything over the years: tutu’s, spandex, crazy leggings and socks, old VB uniforms, funny names on the back of their shirts and lots of crazy hairstyles. It’s a great bonding experience with their classmates. They develop their own cheers and chants, have hilarious names announced at the games, it’s just a night of great memories and fun. Everybody loves it.” said Perkins.

Students who play now greatly enjoy it. Something that sophomore Jonathon Maros enjoyed was “The fact that it was mainly ran through the volleyball players and that we got to play together with our friends from other sports,”

In a poll conducted on the Livewire’s twitter, 82 percent said that they would like to see rocketball and/or powderpuff games played in the spring. Green wants to see powderpuff played in the spring. “It’s something that everyone can have fun with and be competitive with, without being in school,” Green said. “It could bring everyone together doing something they may like.” A petition was even made by seniors Baylee Quire and Haley Hebner to have another game between the junior and senior powderpuff teams.

Other members of the student body are also in favor of them being played in the spring. “We really enjoyed playing on the team everyone was really having fun playing the sport.Plus we really loved the friendly competition between the teams” said Maros.

Perkins is not opposed to having more games. She has worked to organize rocketball games during the winter homecoming before. Due to the gym often being booked for basketball games and other activities, she has not had much luck. She wishes that she would be able to organize the activity during the winter/spring. “As Homecoming Sponsor, I would love to add more events to basketball homecoming week. We’ll just have to take a look at the gym schedule and see what we can work out,” Perkins said.

As for powderpuff, there have been challenges organizing it. It would be a struggle to play in the winter or spring according to Raley.. “I have mentioned that to our administrators and as of now there will only be one night offered during our fall homecoming week. It does take a lot of time to organize this event. This year it was a struggle to have persons to volunteer to coach. And finding times when everyone can practice is a real challenge,” said Raley.

Whether or not the two sports will be played in the future is up in the air.