To see a slideshow from the quidditch match, click here.
University students clad in purple and maroon jerseys collided and wrestled with each other Saturday afternoon at the Acadian field as LSU played Texas A & M in a Quidditch match.    With broomsticks in hand, the Tigers and Aggies tied when both teams won two of the four games.    Quidditch originated in J.K. Rowling’s “Harry Potter” series; but, the interpretation of the fictional game began in Middlebury, Vt. thanks to Xander Manshel and Alex Benepe. Kori Lopreore, team captain and literature junior, said Quidditch began at the University when his friend Sarah Berrard, a literature senior, thought it would be a fun idea.Lopreore researched Quidditch online and found a set of rules from the Intercollegiate Quidditch Association. Initially, he and Berrard played the game among friends in March 2008. The team has increased to fourteen players.    Manshel and Benepe brought the game to life a few years ago when they subsituted a person for the snitch. In the books, the snitch is a gold ball with wings that the seekers have to catch. In today’s version, the player wears gold and has a tennis ball attached to his back.    The game ends when the seeker catches the snitch.    Team members besides the seeker are prohibited from touching the snitch in any way.    Other team members include two beaters and three chasers. Beaters throw bludgers –or dodgeballs– and chasers throw quaffles — slightly deflated volleyballs or soccer balls– through hoopes planted in the ground.    Maureen Foley, English and media writing instructor, said Harry Potter demonstrates the human imagination’s capabilities.    “The things are infinite,” she said. “To the every flavor jelly beans [from the book being manufactured and sold in stores] to a sport to a movie, when it’s popular it touches the imagination.”     Johnny Voltz, civil engineering junior, didn’t play Quidditch until Saturday when Dustin Harless, president of the Quidditch club and team member, said they needed more players.Lopreore said a game only requires seven players, but wanted extra players to change in and out.”We had about fourteen or fifteen people there,” Lopreore said.    “The vocabulary is funny, but it’s not too tough, I guess,” Voltz said after learning the rules.However, Voltz made the second game interesting while he played snitch. Voltz sprinted away from the University seeker and jumped into the water behind Emily Blake Hall.    “I had decided to go in the lake to make it more interesting,” Voltz said. “But the mud was up to my chest, and it was dirtier than I expected.”    The seeker, Noel Marcantel, took his shoes off before diving in after Voltz.     “Once he was in the lake, I knew he wasn’t getting far,” said Marcantel, history sophomore. “It was just a matter of wrestling him.”    Voltz and Marcantel wrestled in the water. And Voltz even tried to hold Marcantel’s head under the water.    “He’s a friend so he wouldn’t get that mad,” Voltz said.    Harless, chemistry junior, said the University team had to tone down the violence because A & M was unused to it.    “We play more rough than they’re used to,” he said. “The Intercollegiate Quidditch Association just recently put out rules to tone down the violence but we’ve been playing since the beginning.”    A & M player, Elizabeth Witt said LSU’s team was more aggresive than they were.    Witt said A & M has only had a team since September 2008.    The University’s team has officialy been active since March 2008.    A & M traveled to Baton Rouge to gain experience of playing other teams. Witt said Quidditch isn’t as popular in Texas as in Louisiana.    The University of Louisiana in Lafayette and Tulane also have teams.    ULL and the University of Georgia dropped out of the Saturday match, Harless said.    The Tigers played in the Third International Quidditch World Cup in Middlebury, Vt. in 2008, placing  fourth overall. “We want to be good enough to go to the World Cup,” Witt said.    Harless said he’s proud of the way the team played as he watched the teams charge toward each other.    “This is the only thing in the world that makes me nervous,” he said.—–Contact Victoria Yu at [email protected]