Bags tournament draws crowd to local bar
Free drinks, bags, a Pimp Fist and a Tony Danza sitcom.
Who’s the Boss? won the first bags tournament held in the parking lot of the Panther Paw Bar & Grill on Saturday afternoon.
Who’s the Boss? did not lose a single game in the 14-team, double-elimination tournament.
They dominated Alpha Tau Omega in the final game with a 21-5 win.
The prize of a 10-dollar gift certificate to the Panther Paw and a bags set was enough for winner Steve Dietz.
“We can drink all day for 10 bucks and get our money back,” he said.
Dietz, a recreation administration major, said the training for the tournament consisted of playing bags every two weeks or so outside of his house and drinking.
Dietz drove by the Panther Paw in the early afternoon and noticed the tournament being promoted on the marquee. He called Joe Longo and told him that he was in a bags tournament.
Longo, a business administration major, was impressed with the tournament that was run by Spin magazine, an online community at Eastern Illinois.
“Spin did a great job with it,” he said.
Spin is a Web site run by Eastern students.
While the initial plan was to make enough money to host a pig roast at a tailgate for Eastern’s Homecoming football game, the Web site didn’t make much money on the tournament and practically broke even.
Lindsey Borrelli, a communications studies major who is one of five Eastern students who run Spin, said that was fine with her.
“We’re trying to get our name out there,” he said. “The site is set up so that the more people use it, the better it is.”
Borrelli is the site’s event planner and said the site is considering hosting bags tournaments more frequently. There are also plans for a haunted house and the idea of mud volleyball in the spring has been tossed around.
The site received donations from local hardware stores and Borrelli built the five sets of bags that were used in the tournament.
She put a Spin logo on the boards as well as part of the site’s attempt at increasing name recognition.
The site has a message board, market place and accepts original submissions from students.
Bags tournament draws crowd to local bar
J.J. Horvath, a senior industiral technology major weighs out two of his bags during the final round of the Spin sponsored tournament held at the Panther Paw on Saturday evening. (Jay Grabiec/The Daily Eastern News)
