Ultimate frisbee resembles the end zone game of football and rugby. But, defensively, it's played like basketball, with your opponent sticking to you like glue. Team Backseat's Mike Ritz leaps into the air to catch the flying disc from the opposing team. [Click to enlarge]

Kids tossing the round disc to one another while sunning themselves in a park on a lazy summer afternoon, right?

Well, that ain't the way Paul Utesch plays.

And to hear this Le Mars native spin it, he wants to max out the sport you play with your dog and take it to the extreme!

"This is definitely not your grandfather's game of frisbee," Utesch smiles. "What we play is 'Ultimate Frisbee!'"

What's Ultimate Frisbee?

It's what happens when two teams of seven players square off around a little round disc. The frisbee's advanced up a field by tossing it from one player to the next in hopes of ultimately completing a pass on the other side of the goal line.

Sorta like football or rugby.

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But, here's the rub.

Defenders stick to one another like glue. And anytime the frisbee's dropped, possession reverts to the opposing team.

Well, sorta like basketball.

"That's what I like about the sport," notes Utesch's co-captain Jesse Ruden. "It's non-stop action!"

Utesch and Ruden are practicing with their team on the field behind the Le Mars Community High School.

"We call our team," Utesch informs, "'Team Backseat.'"

"Better explain the name, dude," advises Ruden, while eyeballing my reporter's notebook, "cuz it's not like we like any of that 'backdoor shenanigans.'"

"The name's been around since we were in school," Utesch explains. "The kids who rode in the back of the bus always seemed to have more fun than the kids who rode up in front."

"Our team's made up of guys (and girls) who've always ridden in the back of the bus," he laughs, "because we definitely want to have fun."

Utesch has been playing Ultimate Frisbee for a year and a half but the sport's been around for more than forty years.

The game traces its roots back to a Maplewood, New Jersey high school in 1967. Some hard-flung flingers at Columbia High School decided to take the leisurely sport of frisbee and kick it up a notch.

One of these seminal student spinners was a young Joel Silver. Silver grew up to become the movie-producing mind behind such mega-Hollywood hits as "The Matrix."

Did Team Backseat have some cutting Keanu-styled moves that they hoping to incorporate? Well, Utesch knew his ragtag team of disc devotees will have their work cut out for them.

Team Backseat had just qualified to compete in the Iowa Games that was being held in Des Moines on July 21.

"Our team's made up of people who've just recently picked up the game," Utesch maintained days before the competition, "and we're still learning to gel as a team. That's why we've been practicing every night of the week."

Utesch looked over at his team of fellow frisbee fanatics.

"We've come a long ways over a short period of time," he said in admiration. "In fact, I think Team Backseat may well be the best kept secret in Le Mars."

"It would be if you'd didn't tell everybody you know about the team," Ruden said, kidding his garrulous friend.

Speaking to Utesch a few days after the game, he is pleased with the results.

"Team Backseat managed to place second in our bracket," he smiles, "and fourteenth overall. Not too shabby."

"More importantly," Utesch insists, "we played some very good teams and gave every team a very good fight."

Being both the team's coach and the sport's most insistent cheerleader, Utesch is already mapping out future plans.

"We're hoping to hit an Ultimate Frisbee tournament in Lincoln in October," he adds, checking his schedule. "That's what I'd like to see for our: more regional tournament play."

"Y'know, that's the only way we can turn Team Backseat into a dynasty," Utesch chuckles.

Until that time, he's taking it easy following the aftermath of the Iowa Games.

"Oh sure, we've had our fair share of sunburns and muscle cramps in Des Moines," Utesch allows. "But we were also dubbed 'most charming team' at the Iowa Games."

"Now, that's gotta count for something, don't you think?" he laughs. "Who knows? Maybe next year, Team Backseat will be known as the most handsome, most athletic, most feared team on the entire Ultimate Frisbee circuit, hmm?"

"Um ... or maybe we'll be known as the most modest," Utesch smiles, flinging it pretty heavily, "or possibly, the most unostentatious team."

The guys in the back of the bus always have the most fun.