St. Louis Collegiate Qualifier

[UofADiscGolf]

Hello,

I’m a player, club officer, and founder of the University of Arkansas Disc Golf team. Originally from St. Louis I’ve stayed connected with the STL disc golf community over the years. I’m contacting the St. Louis Disc Golf Club to see if there would be any interest in holding a Collegiate Disc Golf Qualifier in St. Louis, Missouri late Winter or early Spring. The collegiate disc golf scene is growing rapidly. In my four years in college the number of teams has increased from around 12 to over 60 teams.

There are 36 invitational spots to the National Collegiate Disc Golf Championships. Many of these spots have been filled, but the National Collegiate Disc Golf Union (NCDGU) is looking for cities to help host qualifiers to fill the open spots that are left. A recent list of qualifiers and teams that have qualified can be found at http://www.ncdgc.com/qualifying.htm.

Since St. Louis is extremely centrally located it could be a great location for a Collegiate Qualifier. Based on location, the teams I feel may be interested are listed below. The NCDGU is willing to grant one qualifying spot to Nationals for every six teams that attend a Collegiate Qualifier. These invitations would be given to the highest placing teams that do not already have a spot secured for Nationals. All money raised would help fund highest placing disc golf teams’ trips to nationals.

I think this would be a great opportunity to expand the horizon of disc golf in St. Louis. With good marketing I believe we could get a decent audience (alumni from colleges competing, avid college sports fans, and regular disc golf promoters) to come support the event. If executed successfully this event would truly have the potential to become an annual tradition in St. Louis.

Also, Missouri is one of the few states East of the Rockies that does not have a collegiate disc golf team. This would be a great opportunity for Missouri to showcase their collegiate talent. All it takes is four individuals taking at least one class (Undergrad, Masters, PHD… etc.) at a school (University, Tech College, Community College… etc.) to form a collegiate disc golf team. The Missouri Collegiate State Title could also be awarded to the highest placing Missouri team.

Let me know what you think. If interested, I would like to contact the NCDGU as soon as possible.

Teams Interested – Arkansas, Purdue, East Tennessee State, Iowa State, Western Kentucky, Tennessee Tech, Kansas, Western Illinois, Illinois, Wisconsin-Stevens Point, Southern Illinois, Colorado State, Kansas State, Berry College, Northern Iowa, Iowa Western CC, Tennessee and many others

An idea in the works. Building Collegiate Disc Golf from the ground up: one tournament, one college, and one player at a time.

[Stubborn Puppet]

Can't speak for the club officers, but this sounds great and I'm sure it'll spread around here in no time. These forums are not usually visited by everyone but once a week, but I'm sure someone will reply accordingly soon.

Thanks for the information and I'm sure we'll see you soon.

[emptv]

Disc up,
If the date is clear on the calendar if/when this happens you can rely on the LAKERS support in any way required, as are attempting to augment our involvement in the running of events. With any luck we can get this event in town for a number of years because if you have an event with people from out of state you can then submit an application for a “tourism grant” on city, county, and state level. I know that $$ are hard to come by now, but the grants are still there and they are not going to come to us and ask us if we want cash.

[UofADiscGolf]

Action has been taken. Looks like there is an extremely good chance that this event will be taking place. Start spreading the word to colleges across Missouri and the Midwest. Lets try to get a team from Mizzou, UMSL, UMKC, and Missouri State.

If you contact any interested teams have them email me at rwblack@uark.edu.

What does everyone think about naming this tournament "The Gateway Classic" or "The Gateway Collegiate Classic"?

Feel free to post any other ideas for a tournament name or any other way we can make this tournament as successful as possible.

Good to hear and see that the St. Louis Disc Golf Club strongly supports the growth of collegiate disc golf.

Ryan Black
University of Arkansas Disc Golf
Midwest Regional Collegiate Ambassador

[dehaas]

How many players are needed per team? You might have enough siue guys to get a team together. I'm taking a few online classes with slu and would play on a slu team if there was enough interest.

[UofADiscGolf]

Each team will consist of four players. During singles rounds the lowest of the four scores from your team is dropped.

A team may field three players, but no score will be dropped. And they will also be limited to one doubles team during doubles rounds.

Teams that play will be able to be recognized as an official collegiate disc golf team and will included in the National Collegiate disc golf rankings http://www.ncdgc.com/rankings.htm.

[TCBROWN]

So for those of you who don't know me. I am the Director of Intramurals at Lindenwood University. And I would like to spearhead this event. I have talked to my University and they are on board. I feel that because of my position I can easily work with other Universities to get them on board. I have been in communication with Ryan Black the local clubs and the local county parks departments. As soon as we get a date hammered out I will get info and flyers out on this site and to collages in the surrounding areas. If anyone is interested in helping plan or run this event email me at tbrown@lindenwood.edu.

Communication is key on this so people aren't double doing work or bombarding the other universities or the parks department with calls and different information.

If someone else is already deep into running this let me know. I'm not set on putting this together but I would like to. I'm just throwing my name into the hat.

Check out the lindenwood section for an update on the course.

[discdoh]

It sounds like a perfect match! Initiative is the key to getting this moving forward, and you seem to have that covered. I just ask that you work with the Board of Directors and keep us in the loop. Thanks for taking this on!

Greg D'OH

[TCBROWN]

Will do. I'm very excited for this event. I'll post updates as they come

[UofADiscGolf]

I am in contact with T.C. Brown and the St. Louis Disc Golf club officers. We have already began to discuss possible dates and tournament format. They will review the information at their next meeting and make decisions then.

In the meantime I have contacted the National Collegiate Disc Golf Union and spoke to Alan Kane and Pete May about the likely possibility of holding this event.

There are 36 invitational spots to Nationals. There are 40 teams that will play at Nationals. The last four spots will be filled by a playoff qualifier the day before Nationals start.

Unfortunately all 36 spots invitational spots have already been reserved for specific qualifying events. http://www.ncdgc.com/qualifying.htm.

Due to mass amounts of teams that are interested in Nationals this year (80+) they are likely going to reserve the spots in they playoff qualifier the day before Nationals to teams that have competed and placed well in collegiate events that did not receive National Championship bids.

This has been another ground breaking year for collegiate disc golf. Next year all collegiate qualifiers will be decided and assigned before the 2012-2013 season starts. These qualifiers will be scattered across the United States to give collegiate teams in any region of the country a chance to play in the National Championships.

The more teams we have that attend this event the more likely it is that St. Louis will be chosen as a location for collegiate qualifier in the following years. Exciting stuff!