Battle n. A large-scale fight between armed forces involving combat. v. To fight.

Ship n. A large boat.

Battleship n. A new thrilling, challenging sport created by BYU-Idaho’s RecSports Program, in which teams in canoes use buckets to fill up and sink the opposing team’s canoes.

“[Playing battleship for the first time] is like experiencing chocolate for the first time,” said Taci Smith, a freshman from Sandy, Utah. “Even watching people eat it, you just don’t know what it’s like until you try it yourself.”

“It’s awesome,” said Tad Sakota, a sophomore from Boise. “You know when you were little kids and wanted to splash each other but couldn’t? Now you can.”

Armed with various items, ten teams position themselves in the pool for each battle.

They compete in three 15-minute rounds and points are awarded in the order that teams are sunk: The first sunk gets one point, second sunk two points and so on.

If more than one team remains after 15 minutes, each team whose canoe is still floating is awarded points based on how many canoes have been sunk already (if three teams are still floating, each receives seven points).

When the game is in play, each player can be armed with only a bucket (of any shape or size) and/or a shield. Anything from garbage cans to Tupperware containers to giant bowls have been used on the offensive.

Small snow-sleds, plastic storage bucket lids and in one case, even an umbrella has been used as a shield to fend off oncoming water.

“[The umbrella] worked pretty well,” said Stephen Hulbert, a freshman from Parma, Idaho.

“It takes a lot of upper body strength,” said Kris Meng, a junior from Rigby, Idaho. “But I fell in love with [battleship]. I couldn’t stop talking about it after we played. It’s been a lot of fun.”

“People get pretty vicious,” added Meng. “We usually do a war cry when we get attacked. You know, a little intimidation factor.”