Soccer Tournament International Students to UWS

It’s a Competition, Not About Competition

By Felicity Bosk

The Mar­covich Well­ness Cen­ter saw inter­na­tional stu­dents from UM-Duluth, Uni­ver­sity of North Dakota, and UW-River Falls to com­pete in a soc­cer tour­na­ment. The sec­ond annual Inter­na­tional Union Soc­cer Chal­lenge was coor­di­nate by the World Stu­dent Asso­ci­a­tion (WSA).

It’s a competition, but it’s not about competition

UWS, in the white t-shirts, played against UWRF in the red – Photo by Felicity Bosk | Explore Superior

Four teams played at once on sep­a­rate halves of the Ther­ing Field­house, while oth­ers sat in the stands on the track cheer­ing their teams on.

The tour­na­ment rules stated the max­i­mum team size was 10 play­ers, and play­ers from both gen­ders could play. Also, no var­sity soc­cer play­ers could play for their team. UWRF came out vic­to­ri­ous and won the cham­pi­onship trophy.

“It’s a com­pe­ti­tion, but it’s not about com­pe­ti­tion,” said WSA Pres­i­dent Abdisa Dawano. “Soc­cer is a sym­bol of con­nec­tion and net­works between dif­fer­ent uni­ver­si­ties and people.”

Coor­di­na­tor Eli­jah Eze­bugwu described how it came about. “We invited inter­na­tional com­mu­ni­ties of stu­dents from all over to come up and play soc­cer with us.”

After the tour­na­ment there was an after party in the multi-cultural cen­ter. “Its a fun way to meet new peo­ple from all over the world,” said Dawano.