Beerpong sweeps the nation

Students around the nation are competing in the newest form of college drinking fun: it is called beerpong. Unlike most sports that are limited to one or two styles of playing, the game of beerpong gives each student an opportunity to find and perfect his or her own style of play as the night goes on. For those of you who are unfamiliar with what you need to play and the rules of the game, let this be a sort of "beerpong for dummies" reference for you. Beerpong consists of a 4x8 piece of plywood decorated with your own logo or drawing artistically painted all over it, 20 solo cups and two Ping-Pong balls. It is that simple. The game can be played several different ways depending on the size of the crowd and the seriousness of your players. The game can be played as 2 vs. 2 or with a team. The easiest and most basic way to play is the 2 on 2 method. This consists of two teams of two players standing on opposite sides the 4x8 table. Each team has ten cups set up on the table's edge, as pins in a bowling alley would be. The idea of the game is to try to throw or bounce Ping-Pong balls into the other team's cups. An avid beerpong enthusiast commented, "My personal preference is definitely the team game. It gets everyone at the party involved and gets everyone to let loose for the night. The team game really relies on everyone fully doing their job and communicating. The team game is not just about you; it is about everyone else. It makes winning worth it and after a long hard night of beerpong games you can be satisfied with your results." There are several in-game rules to follow while playing the 2 vs. 2 game. The game starts with a sort of throw-off, to see which team shoots first. Players from both teams shoot back and forth one by one, and as one team makes it, the other has to follow with a make or the other team starts with the first shot. Once this is determined, the game is simple: both players from each team shoot at the other team's cups until one team runs out of cups. Whatever cups are left on the winning team's side of the table are to be drunk by the losing opponents. The lone rule about bouncing the ball is that the team who was bounced on will have to remove two cups if they are scored on. If the ball is bounced, you may swat it away from the cups in the air to prevent the two-cup penalty; good advice says to be aware at all times. Another way of playing the game involves teamwork. Teams can consist of as many people as you would like. The way to play this type of beerpong is to set up three cups on opposite sides of the table. Each team selects one shooter and the other teammates stand on the one side of the table across from the other team. The idea for the team in this game is to be able to drink and flip your cups quicker than the other team. Once a ball is made in a cup, whatever side of the table the ball is made on is where each team starts to drink. The first person from both teams on the side the ball was made drinks their cup and places it with its bottom facing down on the edge of the table. Then, they are supposed to flip the cup and have it land on the open end, so that the bottom of the cup is now facing up. The next person may not start drinking until the person in front of them has flipped their cup successfully. Once this is done you go down the line of your team until the last person on your team completes the flip. Whichever team flips all of its cups first wins. The losing team only removes one of the three cups if the team that won is the team that shot. So, if any shooter shot and his team won, the other team would remove a cup, but if someone shot and the other team won then the other team would not have to remove a cup and the shooter would just get the ball back to shoot again. This is played until one team loses all three cups and then the game is over. This little known team game is very simple and easy to play, but tends to leave everyone more drunk at the end of the night which is not such a bad thing, considering that most people probably set out to obtain drunkenness in the first place. Now that you know your basics to at least two types of beerpong games, what are you waiting for? Go out and enjoy a night of endless beerpong. Perfect your skills and hopefully this well-loved game will be recognized for its athleticism and competition and can become the newest addition to the athletic department.