Spikeball club members battle it out on the upper quad. The Spikeball Club and the Pinky Swear Pack Club hosted a joint event called Play for a Purpose on May 1. (Dom Tritchler/The Crest) 
A registration booth was set up for the Spikeball tournament. The Play for a Purpose event donated its entrance fees to the Pinky Swear Pack Foundation. 
Club members played near Dowling Hall. (Dom Tritchler/The Crest)
The St. Thomas Spikeball Club has been hosting events and meetings for its members since 2023, and now, its leaders hope to make it an official club sport.
Spikeball is a sport that increased in popularity following a Shark Tank appearance in 2015. It is commonly seen on college campuses as a way to connect with friends, but some colleges also compete in it. The sport uses a round net and a ball, and players must hit the ball across the net so that the other team cannot return it.
The St. Thomas club hosts both leisure and competitive games, the latter of which junior and Vice President Isaac Cody said were started last year. This year, it also co-hosted a charity event.
The Spikeball Club competes sectionally, regionally and nationally. Its members are the reigning Midwest Sectionals champions of 2024, and the club is headed to nationals in Indiana on May 24. Because of these competitions, Cody and club president junior Reid Pfutzenreuter said they hope to be recognized as an official club sport at St. Thomas.
“We’ve talked about switching over to a club sport recently; we just haven’t done the full process of doing that yet,” Pfutzenreuter said. “We’re still technically just a club, but we’re competing against other schools, so that’s kind of where that club sports aspect comes through.”
Cody and Pfutzenreuter said they saw others playing on campus, but not as part of a club or organization. Because of their spikeball pasion prior to college, they decided to create one so that people could play and hang out, Cody said.
“We just thought that bringing a club to St. Thomas was a good opportunity, and there obviously wasn’t one already, so we thought of the idea and then just brought a bunch of friends together to make it happen,” Pfutzenreuter said.
Pfutzenreuter said that though spikeball is on the rise, it is mostly seen as a leisure activity rather than a competitive one.
“I know the old club director wasn’t super fond of having a club of a sport and a sports club and being able to differentiate the two,” Pfutzenreuter said.
Pfutzenreuter said that most students are unaware of the club’s existence and that he hopes to educate them if they see spikeball as a solely leisurely activity.
“If they want to start getting into it competitively and not just a friendly game, then we offer both opportunities for people,” Pfutzenreuter said.
First-year and club member Dominick Mueller said he went to the meetings in the fall to play for fun but is also competing at nationals, both things that would continue to happen if Spikeball Club became a club sport.
“I think (trying to become a club sport) is pretty cool. We’re a smaller school and they really only have that at a lot of bigger schools,” Mueller said. “I think if we do well in (nationals), we’ll have a good chance of becoming an official club sport.”
Along with a new competitive side and their sights set on bigger things, the club is expanding with a new event this semester. On May 9, they partnered with a new St. Thomas club, Pinky Swear PACK, for a “Play for a Purpose” event to raise money for childhood cancer survivors.
“We’ve never done a buy-in tournament,” Cody said. “We just normally have people sign up for free.”
Though Mueller did not attend Play for a Purpose, he said he thinks similar events are good for the club.
“Trying to grow and get the official club, I think that’s really important, doing a lot of things like that.” Mueller said. “(It) looks good with the school, with all the guys, everything like that.”
Cody said Pinky Swear PACK reached out to Spikeball Club because they wanted to find an event that people “would be willing to pitch in a couple bucks for” and to get access to the club’s members and nets.
“Obviously they have their members and their people,” Cody said. “Ours might not coincide, but we can bring them all together to raise a lot of money.”
Bridget Schmid can be reached at schm1520@stthomas.edu.
