New Raleigh team wins in clanging game

Matt Crisp of Charlotte slammed his wheelchair into a red-shirted rival from Raleigh, blocking a goal in a demonstration game of wheelchair rugby Friday at Charlotte Bobcats Arena.

The Carolina Crash, based in Charlotte, and the Raleigh Sidewinders clashed in a demonstration of how people with physical limitations can still participate in rigorous sports. Raleigh won the game 26-22.

Both teams are new and working toward becoming official teams eligible to compete in the national finals in coming years. Charlotte's team was active for seven years, disbanded and then reorganized this year.

Players say they were inspired to reorganize by the 2005 documentary "Murderball," which is about the sport.

If you haven't been to a game before, the first thing you'll notice about wheelchair rugby is the sound. It's like a demolition derby with all the clanking, clunking and crashing of the chairs as players scramble for the ball.

The second thing you'll notice is that it is a contact sport. Players smash into their opponents to block goals, knock the ball from their opponents' laps and block passes. Sometimes they knock each other out of their wheelchairs.

"It's illegal, but the most dangerous thing is called a spin," said Crisp, who was injured in a car accident when he was 18. "You hit behind the axle, and it will cause the chair to violently spin and flip over."

Crisp said he has had two concussions from spinning and flipping backward. One was at a game several years ago in Denver. He was taken to an emergency room because the hit left him dizzy.

That intensity is what the players love about the sport.

"I like the contact," Crisp said. "This is the only sport out there that allows contact for disabled people."

The youngest member of the Carolina Crash is 13-year-old Sam Robb of Waxhaw. A viral infection when he was 13 months old left him paralyzed from the chest down. He started playing wheelchair rugby in Ohio and joined the Charlotte team when his family moved to the area in August.

"It's a lot of fun hitting people," said Sam, who also played sled hockey when he lived in Ohio.

His mother, father and two sisters came to Friday's game.

"(My mom) doesn't like me to get hit too hard, but it's just part of the game," he said.

Sharon Robb said her son gets a lot of confidence and self-esteem from playing wheelchair rugby, so she's supportive, despite the hitting.

"This is what he loves," she said. "He loves the action, the camaraderie, the hitting. His participation in sports makes him feel like a regular kid."

Crisp agrees with that sentiment. He said that he was depressed when he first became paralyzed but that wheelchair rugby reinvigorated him.

"It was an opportunity to start living again," he said.