Michelle Sz wants to intimidate you. 鈥淚 have this really terrifying attitude,鈥� said the dodgeball player who had dressed as a zebra to warm up before a playoff game Saturday. 鈥淧eople say I have a really scary game face.鈥�
Sz, 27, says she has been trapped by dodgeball. She鈥檚 addicted to the sport and describes herself as a fierce competitor but said the main purpose of the 麻豆传媒映画Dodgeball League is for friends to gather and have a blast working up a sweat by pelting each other with soft projectiles.
Her team, the Discovery Channel, came wearing animal onesies: her brother Ronald was a kangaroo. There was a tiger, an owl, a red panda and a raccoon鈥揹og.
The league鈥檚 16th season came to and end Dec. 7 and 8 at 麻豆传媒映画Technical secondary for two intense afternoons of playoff dodgeball.
WATCH highlights from the season's Monday night league:
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Adults of all shapes, sizes and abilities, mostly between the ages of 19 and 35 packed the East Side gym for a double elimination tournament in front of a boisterous crowd of mostly fellow players.
鈥淲e are going to have fun, that is the spirit of the entire thing,鈥� said Ronald Sz, 19, before stripping off his kangaroo onesie and joining his teammates on the court as Michael Jackson鈥檚 鈥淏eat It鈥� thumped loudly.
The Discovery Channel didn鈥檛 win the championship but they won the award for best team uniform.
At the end of the regular season, Discovery Channel was tied for 9th out of the 16 teams in the top tier, which meets Monday nights. Their first opponent, The Lantern Corps, was the second seed.
KNOW nothing about dodgeball? Or watch this great video from the International Dodgeball Association:
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Discovery Channel lost 1-3 in the best of five series against the Lantern Corps and then went on to lose 2-3 in a nail-biting match against the MazDebators that saw the Discovery Channel win the first game and then lose the second, win the third and then ultimately fall behind. The second loss ended their post-season.
Michelle Sz said her team, which played together for the first time this season, was at a disadvantage from the start facing two teams with players who had been together for a few years.
鈥淲e were close, just maybe the team was a little tense,鈥� she said.
Though frustrated by the loss, she said she had a great time.
鈥淧laying with so many people鈥� it is just so much fun. You get to really to know people in the community,鈥� she said.
With over 1,500 VDL players and teams playing over four nights each week, clearly the Sz siblings aren鈥檛 the only fans of the sport.
Playoff referee, Truong Cao, 31, was instrumental in setting up the league eight years ago when 12 players came together for drop-in games. The David Thompson secondary alumnus said the league has grown beyond what he and the four other founders ever imagined. He said plans for the future are even grander.听
鈥淲e have pretty lofty goals of taking it, I want to say to a global scale, but that sounds like reaching beyond what we can do. We want to at least take it beyond Vancouver.鈥�
They intend to expand the league to Richmond and Burnaby, throughout the province and across Canada, he said.
The 17th 麻豆传媒映画Dodgeball League season gets underway in January.
For information on the VDL and tournament results, visit .
