Tucker goes down at Owen Beach

Residents from Tucker and Owen residence halls met for the third time in three years to compete in the Battle for the Beach Saturday. The competition determined what the beach would be called: Tucker Beach, as it has been for the past two years, or Owen Beach.

Tucker went down.

"Tucker always wins. This year, it's time for the beach to be called Owen Beach," Kristy Kenney, a sophomore in animal science and resident advisor in Owen, said.

Battling over the name of the beach is a tradition between the two residence halls.

"This used to be a tradition, and they did this battle between halls for 20 years but stopped by the early '90s. We are now at our third year back," Cathleen Bury, freshman in First Year College, said.

Men's sumo wrestling started the festivities. One Owen resident and one Tucker resident suited up in sumo wrestling costumes and tried to wrestle the other out of the circle.

"It feels good beating that Tucker guy. It must be tough to get up off the ground in one of those sumo suits," Owen resident Paul Parkhurst, a freshman in First Year College, said. "I wouldn't know though, because I was never down there."

Residents competed in a volleyball tournament next to the sumo wrestling, forming teams of six to help score points for their hall. Team Tucker had Team Owen diving in the sand for the ball, but Owen could not pull it out.

"Ugh, Owen lost in volleyball. We're just going to have to win in trivia and tug-of-war," Bury said.

The next round was the Quiz Bowl to test residents with questions about general knowledge, movies, N.C. State and miscellaneous facts. Just like Bury said, Owen Hall answered the most questions correctly adding more points to Owen's overall score.

The final and deciding round was the tug-of-war. The teams were of Tucker boys vs. Owen boys and Tucker girls vs. Owen girls. This seemed to be the most intense round of the Battle of the Beach, as this event involved the most trash talking.

"Man, Tucker girls are wack!" an Owen bystander said, while a Tucker resident yelled "We got to protect this beach! This is our beach yo!"

After numerous rounds of tugging, Owen had the most tug-of-war wins, claiming the new title of the beach, Owen Beach.

There was more to Battle of the Beach than just the competition.

RAs Kenney, Karen Taylor, a sophomore in accounting and Faryal Zahoor, a junior in sociology, passed out raffle tickets and T-shirts to all participants. The shirts said "Meet us at the beach, it's goin' down," this year's Battle of the Beach slogan. The RAs were also getting competitive in this competition.

Molly Widmyer, a sophomore in First Year College, helped with the prize distribution and the raffle tickets. The winners received prizes such as DVDs, footballs, and candy.

Finally, everyone who attended the event could get plates of pizza, barbecue and wings.

The Owen and Tucker Resident Hall Council provided the services for the participants.