It all started on July 14, 2003, when Boston University student Andy Potter and friends Steve McDonagh and Joe Griffin were unfruitful in their quest to see then- rookie LeBron James play a training camp game at University of Massachusetts-Boston. The boys went back to McDonagh’s house in Quincy and started a game of soccer, but they quickly grew tired of kicking the ball around and searched to find a new sport to entertain them. And just like that, out of boredom, Andyball was born. ‘I can’t remember exactly how it went, College of Arts and Sciences junior Potter said. ‘All I know is we were playing soccer, we got bored and we started making Andyball and coming up with the rules.’ Andyball requires two teams of 10 to 12 players, a soccer ball, two street hockey nets and two lacrosse sticks. The object of the game is to be the first team to score 20 points. Andyball is played on a basketball court with nets at both ends. To advance the ball, players either dribble or pass the soccer ball to one another. To score, players can either get a touchdown worth two points or score a goal worth four. To score a touchdown, a player must pass the ball to a teammate in the opposing team’s end zone.?The teammate must catch the ball while it is in the air and then touch the ball to the ground while maintaining possession.’ To score a goal, a player can do anything except throw the ball into the opposing team’s net. Potter, McDonagh and Griffin brought the idea of Andyball to school with them and slowly gathered a following. ‘At first we would struggle to get kids down and we’d have to play three-on-three half court,’ School of Education junior Joe Eckstrom said. ‘Then all we would talk about was Andyball in school, and we would tell kids to come out for Andyball, we tried to get people who already played sports. The other kids we would invite, the ones who were not a part of our tight knit group, would start inviting their friends, and eventually it got to where I wouldn’t know kids who were coming to Andyball.’ For three years every summer and on random weekends, the guys would play Andyball gathering members. In 2007, the group realized they needed to expand, so they developed an official league for Andyball. ‘We moved from Steve’s street because we really couldn’t play there anymore,’ Potter said. ‘For one thing, we got too big, we would ruin his bushes. More kids started playing, word spread and we would get like 20 or 30 kids on some neighborhood street, so we started playing behind some neighborhood in Quincy. We would get so many kids that we eventually decided to make a league, and now we have teams and we play every summer almost every Saturday.’ The league is composed of about 80 members ages 16 to 22. Each summer, the teams compete for the Dayton Cup, the championship trophy named after McDonagh’s street where Andyball was born.’ In the inaugural Andyball season in June 2007, four teams, The Dragons, El Chico, O’Leary’ and The Yellow Jackets competed for the Dayton Cup. After a summer of heated competition, The Yellow Jackets took home the trophy. ‘Winning the Dayton Cup in 2007 is my favorite Andyball moment,’ Yellow Jackets captain Potter said. Currently the league has six teams ‘- The Brawlers, Bulldogs, Crusaders, O’Leary, The Panthers and Yellow Jackets. Last year, O’Leary took home the Dayton Cup. ‘Last year, [Potter] won and he had the cup in his room on his dresser, and we were roommates, and I had to look at it every day,’ Eckstrom, an O’Leary member, said. ‘But this year, I have it on my mantle.’ ‘ According to the official Andyball website, the early games were much more dangerous because defined rules had not been established. ‘There were no boundary lines in any direction, below the waist hits and blows to the back were not only allowed, but encouraged, and large pileups and fights for possession on neighborhood lawns were common,’ the website stated. ‘The neighbors were not pleased.’ ‘It’s a rough game, and as we get older, I don’t know how much are bodies will be able to take,’ Eckstrom said. Though Andyball rules have progressed a lot since the early days, injuries are not uncommon. Some players tore their ACLs, and another blew out a kneecap. ? ‘I got a concussion during the playoffs, and stitches during the regular game,’ Andyball cofounder and Clark University junior Joe Griffin said. Though Andyball has grown quickly since its humble beginnings five years ago, Eckstrom, Griffin and Potter have trouble seeing the game expanding much further. Potter, who maintains the website and the sport along with the five other captains, said the sport might not last past this summer unless some of the newer players step up to the plate. ‘This year is going to be really important because this could be the last year,’ Potter said. ‘It depends on how much work people want to do for it. Me and the captains and Joe Griffin, we run everything.’ ‘I am 21,’ Potter said. ‘I can’t be doing this forever.’