The players mosey up to the tee, some lagging behind the others. The group members, who don’t resemble typical athletes, hold circular plastic objects as they prepare mentally for the game at hand.

The first player takes a few steps then intensely flings his disc. The rotating mass seems to disappear into thin air before hitting the dirt and rolling down the slightly-hilly field.

Suddenly colliding into a metal pole, the disc briefly spins like a top before retiring lifelessly to its side.

All he has to do now is pick it up, give it a backhand toss past the rattling chains and into the basket. With a birdie on the first hole, he jumps out into an early lead. One down, eight to go.

He is playing disc golf, which now has a club at NIU.

“Mainly, it gives some free time to relax, walk around and get outside,” said Ryan Liebman, vice president of the NIU Disc Golf Club. He has been playing the sport for nearly three years.

He said he sees students, faculty and community members playing disc golf at Prairie Park, 401 Clifford Dr., but he notices they aren’t playing together.

“It’s a way for everyone to meet each other,” said President Mike Spychal, an avid player for almost eight years. “There’s a lot of interest in the area. I figured we’d try to round ’em all up.”

Beginners and experts, faculty and staff, students and community members alike are welcome to join the NIU Disc Golf Club.

Disc golf, which also goes by such names as Frisbee golf or Frolf, is played like regular golf – except a Frisbee is used instead of a ball and clubs, holes are replaced by metal baskets, players generally wear what they’re wearing that day, it’s free to play and courses are usually at public parks.

While it may not sound like a sport to some, success in disc golf takes concentration, skill and finesse to sink a frisbee into a basket approximately three feet in diameter 200 yards away.

Junior criminology major Brad Winterberger said he plays disc golf back home in St. Charles on occasion.

“I probably wouldn’t join it, but I think it would be a good club,” said Winterberger, who has some friends who play disc golf. “I know some people who might be interested.”

Liebman stressed one of the club’s main goals is to keep the parks where they play clean.

Even at the first meeting, they hope to pick up bottles and cans from the course and make the park look nicer, he said.