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The original members didn’t intend a picnic-in-the-park game; they played to win and claimed some highly skilled ringers in the ranks. The players included everyone from a local doctor to a staff plumber to volleyball and swimming coaches.

When players moved away or retired, the games eventually turned into pickup matches with blended teams of students, faculty, coaches and staff. Today, it’s a campus-wide, multi-generational, open invitational that features fun, fierce, comical competition.

The games are played with a lot of laughs, up to a point—the point when winning and bragging rights are on the line. But the laughs always continue afterward, sometimes for years—even generations.

And while they still occasionally divide teams by “youngers” and “olders,” history shows that the youngers often come up on the short end of the net.

“Students would get totally antagonized if they couldn’t beat us,” says Lou Ortmayer, a retired political science professor who alleges that one student got a staff job after graduating, “Just so he could find a team to beat us.

“He brought the basketball team after their season ended. They were much bigger than we were, but they weren’t volleyball players,” Ortmayer says. He still savors the memory of how the frustrated basketball players even tried dunking the ball:

“It was fun beating them."

Physics Professor Dan Boye has played most games since coming to Davidson 30 years ago and only skips when he’s hurt or on sabbaticals. He is best known for “The Dan Boye shot” that goes something like this:

“He sets low, then goes and does a backward trick shot,” Thompson says, trying to demonstrate the sort-of-reverse pirouette Boye performs. “It’s my favorite of all time.”

Boye says he’s adjusted his routine over the years. He always wears kneepads, not because he dives for the ball anymore, but to warm his knees so he can jump a few inches. He also now serves underhand.

“You gotta adapt as you ferment,” Boye says.

And sometimes a little trickery helps.

If for example, you want to distract the other team, you might call out, “I smell cookies!” Or if you’re really tired and hungry and want lunch, complain that “Nothing’s left in the freezer.”

What Goes Around

Roberta Quis Fox ’03, whose four years playing volleyball for the Davidson women’s team included two conference championships, remembers longing to join the pickup games as a student.

“I had to wait for four years because my coach wouldn’t let me play until my last season was over,” Fox says. “So I worked my class schedule around it that spring.”

Fox, who now lives in Charlotte, rejoined the group for the final May game. It was her first time playing with them since her graduation, and she hopes to do it a lot more often.

“It’s really fun to be back and reconnect with this group,” she says.

There’s also a bit of a generational circle here.

When Fox was a student, Krentz had three young sons, including twins. Now they’re grown—the oldest just got married—and Fox has three young children, including twins. “I want to get some twin parenting advice from him,” she says.

Playing volleyball again reminded her of how much she loved competing with her professors and seeing their outside-the-classroom personalities. And occasionally schooling them:

“Dr. Krentz gave me the worst grade I ever got at Davidson, so sometimes on the volleyball court I feel like I can take it out on him with a kill or a block,” she says with a wide, innocent-looking smile. “But I’m not aiming at him or anything.”