Paul was frustrated. After all of his effort in rallying his team to the softball game, he still fell short on players — another forfeit.
After mulling over his situation for a few days, Paul Fiske had an epiphany, a solution to the nefarious forfeit problem. Within a week, his vision became reality and now Fiske’s gift to the intramural world is accessible to all BYU students. It’s called FillMyTeam.com.
FillMyTeam.com is a free website devoted to minimizing forfeits and maximizing participation in BYU intramural sports.
“The most frustrating thing about intramurals is forfeits,” Fiske said. “My site helps players and captains coordinate together to fill up teams.”
The site provides both free agent listings where students interested in playing can post profiles and also team listings where captains can post team vacancies. The goal of the site is to help players find teams and help captains find players for their teams.
Fiske’s site also features a champions page where teams or individuals who win the most coveted blue shirt on campus can submit their photos — thereby immortalizing themselves in BYU intramural history. Fiske is eager to create an upcoming rankings page as well.
“I don’t want it to seem like it’s an exclusive club or anything,” Fiske said. “I definitely want anybody and everybody who wants to play on a team be able to play on a team.”
Will Nuckolls, a sophomore from Provo, recently used the site for the first time.
“I mean, if not for FillMyTeam, I probably would not have been able to play intramural soccer this fall, so it’s really saved me,” Nuckolls said.
Nuckolls has played in several intramural competitions, but this is his first time organizing his own team. Since many of Nuckolls’ teammates have left on their missions, he found himself short of a full team until he found the website.
“It’s made it so much easier to find teams, and if you just want to play sports, but don’t have a team, you can just sign up,” Nuckolls said.
Rob Gardner, a physical science education major from Heber, has been heavily involved in intramurals throughout his years at BYU, both as a captain and team member. He said the worst part of intramurals is going through the effort of putting a team together and then not having enough team members show up for the games.
Gardner feels although the site will be helpful for individuals looking for teams or filling teams he does not envision the site having a greater impact on intramural athletics as a whole.
Fiske, on the other hand, ultimately would like to see raised numbers of BYU students involved in intramurals.
“I think that reflects the mission of the intramural program — to get more people involved,” Fiske said. “That’s my hope with the site, to just let more people play and to help less forfeits happen.”
