Fri 8/26-Sun 8/28
If there’s a game that involves chasing little balls, odds are you’ll find men lining up to participate. Such is the case with the Bocce Challenge Cup taking place 8/26-28 at the Wickliffe Italian American Club.
The 33rd annual affair finds nearly 100 teams from across the states competing for cash prizes totaling $16,000. There’s also live entertainment, music and, of course, food vendors providing homemade Italian food and specialty dishes, as well as traditional American fare.
CoolCleveland talked to Bocce Challenge Cup media director Larry Koval about the largest men’s bocce tournament in the Midwest.
In terms of national competitions, how big is the Wickliffe event?
It’s very big. We cap it at 96 teams and we have a waiting list. There are four guys on a team, half are from out of town. It’s good for the area. It puts the city on the map, really. Also, people who have participated told me our event is the best. It’s just the way our facility is laid out, everything is right there. You don’t have to walk far to get food or drink or listen to entertainment. It’s all kind of self-contained within our grounds there. Parking is easy and we have overflow parking lots with shuttle buses. And our courts are really some of the best around. They really take good care of them so they play well. Also, we treat everybody fairly. Some of the tournaments that even some of our guys go to they say favor the home teams by what courts they put them on, who they pair them against. Ours is impartial. And the best teams end up winning.
What’s the history behind the Bocce Challenge Cup?
This is the 33rd year. It goes way back. The first few years it wasn’t in Wickliffe but they moved there after the third year or so. We continued to expand our facilities there. We now have nine covered courts. We get teams from all over the place: Toronto, Buffalo, Rochester, Hartford, Youngstown and Warren.
In our area, how popular is bocce?
It’s become very popular. I started playing probably right around 2000 and it was mostly older guys. I would say by 2006, all of a sudden a lot of younger guys started taking up the game. And these young guys are good. They’re phenomenal. They’re very athletic. The team that’s won our tournament the last two years is a group of kids from Murray Hill and Mayfield Heights, all under the age of 26. And they’ve beaten two of the top teams around. Two years ago they won, beat a team of international players that competed in the international games. These guys are like rock stars. The first tournament they ever entered, they won $10,000 in Chicago. They’re young, good-looking and passionate. They’re a crowd favorite now.
Why did you get involved with competitive bocce?
I used to play golf a lot, but during the day it takes a lot of time and it’s pretty expensive. This I can play in the evenings. It takes about an hour to play a game and it was just a lot of fun hanging out with guys on teams. Everybody has that competitive nature but you’re not going to be playing basketball at age 60-plus.
In a nutshell, bocce involves each team getting as close to a target ball as possible, right?
Yes, it’s pretty simple but there’s strategy too. It’s a game that anybody can play but not everybody can play well. There’s some skill involved, hand-eye coordination. When you’re trying to make a point, you take more of a finesse shot. And then there are other shots where the other team’s ball is close to the polina, the target ball, and you want to hit their ball out. That’s almost like a pool shot. These guys throw it with the palm of their hand facing out, and their wrist fully cocked and arm extended. They come forward and snap their wrist and put a lot of backspin on their ball so when it hits the target ball, it stays close, almost like a pool shot where you put backspin on a cue. Some of these guys are so good, they’ll hit yours out and their ball sticks next to the polina. It’s fun to watch.
Finally, do you have to be Italian to be a good bocce player?
(laughs) No, but it helps.
[Written by John Benson]