Community High School of Arts and Academics Quidditch Team in Roanoke and The Roanoke Harry Potter Festival is co-hosting an Exhibition Quidditch Match with Community High School and invited team(s) at William Fleming Stadium on Saturday May 13th from 9:00-11:00.
This United States Quidditch Association sanctioned event is an opportunity to share the spirit, joy and sport of Quidditch. The Community High School Dragons want to inspire fans to establish their own community of Quidditch and further the USQ mission of not only envisioning but realizing “a future where every person in the United States is aware of quidditch as a sport and has the opportunities to play and engage at all levels.”
This Quidditch Exhibition will also further Community High School’s mantra: Teamwork is our vision. Bruising is our journey.
The United States Quidditch Association awarded the Community High School of Arts & Academics Quidditch Team with the 2016 Xander Manshel Award for furthering the USQ Mission of Creativity, Community and Competition.
The sport of quidditch is primarily a college game. The high school’s quidditch team was founded in 2012, during a time when there was no other official high school quidditch team in the country. Roanoke’s team became the first and presently oldest official high school team.
The Community High team of over twenty students is co-ed and has included foreign exchange students from Jordan, Afghanistan, Germany, India and Mexico. The Community High “Dragons” can be seen practicing during the academic year most often at River’s Edge Fields or Highland Park in Roanoke.
The team has hosted Exhibition Games at the Roanoke GoFest. The Dragons have appreciated intense scrimmages with the Virginia Tech Quidditch Team over the past five years; as well as games with other college Quidditch teams from outside the state.
Originally a fictional sport, Quidditch, was created by J.K. Rowling in her Harry Potter novels. Each house in the Hogwarts School had a team, competing on flying brooms. Four balls were used: a Quaffle, two Bludgers, and a Golden Snitch. Each end zone had three, ring-shaped goals on top of poles at various heights. In the books and the films the sport was extremely rough.
Fiction became reality in 2005 when a group of students at Vermont’s Middlebury College developed a Muggle version of the sport. The original co-founder, Xander Manshel, was a Middlebury freshman at the time who collaborated with Alex Benepe to develop the sport further. College teams formed, and competition spread rapidly. Within two years the first International Quidditch Association World Cup was held.
Athletes are grounded on a field (the pitch), playing with broomsticks, which handicap the competitors, forcing them to play with one-hand. The “quaffle” is a deflated volleyball that can be thrown through one of the goals by the chasers or even the team’s goalie, the keeper. The “bludgers,” deflated dodge balls, are thrown by beaters to knock out another player who after hit must run to their goal in order to return to play.
The seekers pursue the snitch who is a fast runner with unyielding endurance and wrestling skills, dressed in golden yellow. Points are accrued through either goals or finally by catching the snitch, which ends the game. Games are high action.
The Community High School student founder made the team’s six goals and many broomsticks from PVC piping, using power tools in his backyard with a friend and using consultation from the experts in the plumbing section of the Salem Lowe’s store.
For further questions contact the Quidditch Team Captain, Alexandra Jabbarpour at: [email protected]
For more information on the Harry Potter Festival Exhibition Match go to:
https://www.usquidditch.org/events/view/roanoke-harry-potter-festival
