Beer Pong

Beer pong is the best.

There’s nothing better than staring down an opponent (or two) from across a sticky table as a ping pong ball plops into a half-full cup of brew. Watch those losers’ faces next time you play, see the disappointment, the sadness, the hurt and anger, and I promise you, you’ll never want to play another drinking game.

It’s true, there are all types of drinking games: screw the dealer, quarters, flip cup — and probably about fifteen thousand other games you’ve never heard of — but it doesn’t matter; they don’t measure up. Beer pong doesn’t require a deck of cards (shuffling sucks), touching coins (they make your hands smell funny) or ten people (if you play five per side in flip cup) to make a game fun.

The thing with beer pong is, it requires a skill. You can get into the groove in flip cup, sure, but face it, you’re flicking a plastic Solo cup, most likely spraying beer residue all over yourself and others around you. It’s a game of luck, like those claw machines in Wal-Mart that make you spend fifteen dollars worth of change to win a stuffed triceratops doll or something. And although I have been known to win my fair share of stuffed animals — with a relatively small amount of money, I might add — flip cup just isn’t the sport that the pong is.

That’s right, beer pong’s a sport. It’s even got a championship series, and it’s called the World Series of Beer Pong. Where is it held? Vegas. The grand prize? $50,000.

There’s also the matter of civility, or, in flip cup’s case, a lack thereof. You drink your fair share of booze in both games, but there’s a significant amount of chugging that takes place in a game of flip cup. It’s actually the name of the game: drink fast. That makes flip cup the Nascar of drinking games. And we all know Nascar sucks.

Beer pong, however, is a game of class — unlike the primal savagery of flip cup. Beer pong is a gentlemanly meet-up of two or more people who have come to settle differences over a cup or ten of beer. Nothing wrong with that, in my book. But, whatever, if you like, drink, drink, drinking as fast as you can until Keystone Light spills down the front of your shirt, fine by me. Happy flicking. Just don’t come around trying to call the next game of beer pong — I’m already on deck.

In closing, I’d like to extend an open challenge to any person, or team of people, at this university: play me in beer pong. I’ll beat you. I swear I will. I went 7-0 the other night, and that’s only because I stopped playing voluntarily. If I hadn’t, my win count would have been significantly higher. Hell, I might still be playing now.

So just try to take me on. I dare you.

Adam Kohut is the A&E editor and a professional writing senior.

Flip Cup

Everyone reading this has probably played both flip cup and beer pong. They are two of the most popular college drinking games in existence (for 21-year-olds and up only, obviously; if you’re not 21, that better be Kool-Aid in your cups).

So what’s the difference? Both involve the same basic concepts: they’re simple and meant to make you drink. The difference lies in the number of people they can entertain, which is where flip cup runs away with this discussion.

Every game of beer pong is the same thing: two pairs of people shoot ping pong balls at six cups. It’s fun at first, but eventually it gets boring. There are always four people maximum, while flip cup can involve as many people as you want.

Think about it: how often have you been at a party just standing around while four people take forever to finish a game of beer pong? It’s frustrating and makes you feel like you’re waiting at the DMV. Had you been playing flip cup, everyone in the room could have taken part.

And we can’t forget about the team camaraderie. In beer pong, the most celebration you get is high-fiving one other person. With flip cup, you can feel the energy of your entire team when you win and you get an intense sense of vengeance when you lose. In beer pong, you’re kicked off the table as soon as you lose. The next time you play, it probably won’t be against the same people. There’s no rivalry.

And really, what’s the point of a drinking game? Drinking. Hence the name. And flip cup provides ample opportunity to drink. You can go through a game of flip in a few minutes, and you drink every time. In beer pong, you could go a whole game without drinking if the team you’re playing is terrible. And if that happens a few times in a row and you leave your beers, they get hot and disgusting.

And we haven’t even talked about sanitation. Do you realize how many people drink out of beer pong cups every night? Nobody who hosts a party where beer pong is played wants to buy enough cups to keep replenishing them, so generally the same 12 cups are left on the table all night.

I know most people don’t care after they’ve become a bit inebriated, but right now you’re (hopefully) sober enough to register that every time you play beer pong, you’re drinking from the same cups that have touched the lips of probably more than 20 people. And that’s if your host replaces the cups every night. I don’t consider myself a germophobe, but that’s just plain disgusting.

And last, but not least, beer pong provides the opportunity to spill your beer. It’s fairly common for someone to knock a cup off the table, thus making you lose while also not drinking. That’s a double whammy. Who would ever support such a heinous proposition? The wasting of alcohol is strictly forbidden by Man Code. Every time a cup of beer spills, a little piece of me dies. Which is why, for my own well-being, I choose to play flip cup.

Corey DeMoss is the Sports editor and a journalism junior.