Bright white lights, cheering fans, teammates sprinting along the sidelines, screaming coaches (for all intents and purposes). This is not a varsity athletics event — this is Brandeis intramural flag football. 

IM flag football at Brandeis is a highlight of the fall semester for many students in lieu of having an actual varsity football team to rally behind. The rosters are stacked with amateur football talent: teams collect recruits from a wide array of club sports and varsity athletics, as well as numerous other clubs and student affiliations. Part of the fun lies in deciphering what the various team names could possibly mean — ask people and they probably will not tell you.

On Sunday night, Oct. 27, the women’s IM flag football championship game saw Caleigh Abbe ’26, Rachel Abramovitz ’27, Hailey Crane ’25, Ellie Greene ’24, Lola Hamilton ’26, Erica Hwang ’25 and Natasha Gutierrez ’26, of team “Go Birds,” defeat team “Sigma Delta Touchdown.” 

As of press time, the men’s IM flag football championship was currently taking place at 9 p.m. on Monday, Oct. 28 between team “YM Hoover Tech” and team “BBC.” The co-educational IM football league playoffs also saw some action on Sunday night, with team “Basement and Co” defeating team “Balls Deeph.” The co-ed championship game will close out the Brandeis flag football season on Oct. 29 at 8 p.m. as team “El Casa Azul” will play “Basement and Co” for the ultimate show of all-around athletic prowess at Brandeis. 

—Editor’s note: The Justice Editor Diane Meyer participated in intramural flag football and contributed to the reporting of this story.