Ultimate Frisbee booming in Naperville

At Naperville's Ashbury Park today, you'll see Frisbees flying, guys running, friends cheering, teams celebrating.

But while the game of Ultimate Frisbee is fascinating to watch, it's the behind-the-scenes action that makes the Naperville Ultimate Frisbee Summer League different from most of the city's sporting ventures.

In a town brimming with park district and YMCA leagues, health clubs and private sports facilities, two area college students organized the independent league to give their friends and other players something a little more serious and regular than the occasional Ultimate pickup game.

Today, the league's 15 teams are playing a championship tournament, wrapping up a second successful season. Sean Parker and Alake Kashyap launched the league last summer with about a dozen teams.

Friends since sophomore year of high school, Parker and Kashyap had played plenty of pickup games. Parker, for instance, started playing Ultimate during track and cross country meets in high school, he said. And he continues to play on a team at his college, the University of Iowa.

And though Kashyap was at the University of Illinois, the friends planned together to start the summer league at home.

"We already knew a lot of kids that played in the pickups," said Parker, 20.

The duo used word-of-mouth and social networks such as Facebook to generate interest and recruit teams for the league. Most players are college students or very recent graduates, but with some high schools fielding Ultimate Frisbee teams, the league has a number of younger players as well. The rosters of four teams are filled with Neuqua Valley High School students, while students from Naperville Central make up two teams. Students from Naperville North, Waubonsie Valley and Lake Park high schools are on other teams.

To foster growth, the league started a form of free agency. Individual players can sign up and teams looking to add a player can pick from those available.

Parker and Kashyap oversee a league Web site, napervilleultimate.com, to keep it all organized. But largely, they rely on the teams to organize themselves and keep the league running smoothly, they said.

"We leave a lot up to the captains to schedule and report scores," said Parker. "We don't have reserved fields, so we put the scheduling up to the captains."

The league put together a nine-week schedule but allows team captains to plan games for times and locations convenient to players from both sides.

For now, the league remains independent, but as it grows, Parker says, he may want to turn it over to Naperville Park District. He hasn't approached park district officials with the idea yet, he said.

Soon, Parker says, he would like the summer league to become sanctioned by the Ultimate Players Association, a national organization for Ultimate Frisbee. The Naperville league already follows the association's rules, which will govern today's championship tournament.

Teams play seven on a side, trying to pass the disc up the field and into the end zone. Once a player catches the disc, the player can't take any more steps. If the disc touches the ground, the team loses possession. A point is scored when a player catches the disc in the end zone. Games are played to 15 points.