Meet the Calamity Janes, IU’s women’s ultimate frisbee team

Josie Zink trudges up to mounds of backpacks and flying discs, water bottles and tennis shoes strewn near a soccer goal on Woodlawn Field. 

She’s carrying a speaker half her size. “Twerkulator” by City Girls booms louder and louder as she gets closer to a huddle of girls in sweatpants and leggings.   

It’s time for the twerkulator   

Imma shake what my momma gave me  

Imma shake my money-maker  

It’s time for the twerkulator  

She plops her items down and begins to dance. It’s 53 degrees, the sun is setting and inky dots of birds flap through the sky.  

The Metz Bicentennial Grand Carillon bell tower clangs an eerie song in honor of Halloween approaching. It clashes with the blasting speaker, the fuel for the ultimate frisbee team’s warm up.   

Calamity Jane Ultimate is Indiana University’s women’s ultimate frisbee club. The disc-slinging Janes welcome players of all athletic ability and experience to join. The sport of frisbee typically attracts a “queer group of people,” second-year IU graduate student Daisy Robles-Magallanes said. She’s found people who think like her on the team, people she feels safe around.  

“It's also just really nice being a safe space for other people,” she said.  

Zink, an IU junior and the team treasurer, corrals the girls — several with pink or blue streaked hair — and they launch into a warm-up exercise akin to a well-rehearsed performance.   

Each player pairs up to fling the discs back and forth, dancing until they snap into action, clapping the white saucers between open hands. The evening grows darker, and floodlights surrounding the field flick on. The grass glistens, afternoon rain remnants staining the girls’ pants with wet splotches.   

The Calamity Janes and sport of ultimate focus on fair play, integrity and having fun. Freshman Tatum Carrington and Robles-Magallanes said playing ultimate has been a drastically different experience than their “toxic” high school sports. 

“The spirit of the game is really just about sportsmanship and about uplifting each other, especially, like, it is a sport, it's competitive,” Zink said. “We all want to win, but beyond that, we all love the sport, and we have respect for each other, and that's something that we don't see in a lot of other sports.”  

Ultimate at all levels of the sport is self-officiated and requires players to know the rules and follow them.  

“We have open discussions whenever anyone calls a foul or any sort of play,” Zink said. “That spirit of the game just means being respectful, being enthusiastic, like all being one frisbee community even though we’re on two different teams.”  

The Calamity Janes have three coaches who have played either in college or on a professional team. During the fall semester, the Janes compete in learning tournaments and prioritize skill development. In the spring semester, the “real season,” the team plays in about five sanctioned tournaments that lead up to sectionals, regionals and nationals.  

The Janes played in their last tournament of the semester in early November. Players can join the team at any point in the semester, Calamity Janes President and IU junior Berkley Humphries said.  

Ellie Jones is a senior at Purdue University and president of Purdue Xpress Ultimate, the university’s own women’s team. Xpress competes against the Janes in some weekend tournaments.  

Ultimate is a “niche” sport, Jones said, so friendship between teams is central in a ruling aspect of the game — having fun. After a game ends, the teams form “spirit circles.” They typically come up with a cheer for their opponents and give out “spirit prizes” to opposing players for playing well, exemplifying the spirit of the game or talking through the rules.  

The Calamity Janes’ roster count is on the smaller side compared to their competitors. In past years, less than 15 were on the team, Humphries said. However, recruitment spiked this year and nearly 30 have joined the community at IU.  

“It’s really cool to see these players (the Calamity Janes) just persevere during tournaments with low numbers, and you can tell that they truly just love the sport and have a good time,” Jones said. “I think that speaks to the team too, is just, they are showing up and having fun, and at the end of the day, it’s obvious they just really like to play frisbee and have a good time doing it.”  

Ultimate is unique, Humphries said. It’s common for people to first get involved when they’re older, and many of the Janes didn’t play frisbee until they went to college. The sport strives to be welcoming, Humphries said.  

“Whether it’s like pickup or league or college, just show up as you are and people will help you learn if you’re willing, no matter where you’re at,” Jones said. 

Carrington was encouraged to join after IU’s RecFest festival this year, where students can talk to representatives from club sports, ask questions and sign up for programs. She didn’t know how to throw a frisbee, but she wanted to stop by the booth because her dad’s girlfriend was a Jane in the early 2000s.  

The Janes at the booth convinced Carrington to go to a practice and told her they would teach her everything.  

“This environment is just a very positive space,” Carrington said. “You cannot feel like you don’t belong here, because they’re all just so kind to you, like so uplifting.” 

Carrington is a lesbian and said the team makes her feel safe and welcome. On the first day of practice, the team introduced themselves by their names and pronouns. 

“They don’t care who you are, where you come from, like what you’re into, like you’re just kind of part of the team,” Carrington said.  

Zink said ultimate in general is one of the most inclusive sports to the LGBTQ+ community. The USA Ultimate Gender Inclusion Policy allows players to play in whichever division they feel most comfortable competing in. USA Ultimate’s divisions are men’s, women’s and mixed.    

“It’s not just about biologically men’s or women’s frisbee, it’s play on the team that you feel comfortable, you love that community,” she said. 

Humphries echoed this and referenced nationwide bans on transgender athletes. In February, the NCAA banned transgender women from competing in women’s sports the day after U.S. President Donald Trump signed an executive order barring transgender women from competing in female sports categories.  

“All the teams in the Midwest call us the lesbian cowgirls, like our team specifically is significantly gayer than the rest” Carrington said. “I don’t know why it’s so gay, but it is, so I think it’s just because it’s such a positive environment.” 

*** 

Zink is practicing in a black, long-sleeve shirt printed with a bison skull, a tribute to IU’s newly introduced mascot. Other players on the field wore jerseys emblazoned with a red design of a woman wearing a western hat and handkerchief, spelling the words “CALAMITY JANE.”  

Calamity Jane Ultimate was created in 1992 after beginning as an offshoot of the IU Men’s Ultimate Frisbee Club, named the HoosierMamas. 

Calamity Jane, the team’s namesake, was a sharpshooter and frontierswoman of the Wild West. The many myths about her make determining her true story difficult, but she was known to ride horses, drink hard and shoot guns. She liked wearing men’s clothing in a time when she could’ve been arrested for it.  

She was rumored to be an orphan, to carry around knives and to have ridden a bull down Rapid City, South Dakota’s main street. She didn’t fit in society’s limits for women. She was boisterous, spontaneous and complicated. She was different.  

The 1953 movie “Calamity Jane” is loosely based on the woman, Martha Canary, and her life. IU’s Calamity Janes sat down to watch the movie and decided to embrace the team’s western theme, Zink said.  

“Even though it’s just like a goofy westerner girl, she was a badass,” Zink said. “We embody her spirit.” 

The Janes have adopted her spirit through their cheers.  

“Who's gonna bring that blood and pain? Calamity, Calamity, Calamity Jane,” Zink chanted.  

To show their love for one another, the girls say the chant “Jane love, true love.” 

Raelyn Hoffman, a freshman, joined the team to try something new. Like Zink, she grew up playing frisbee with her dad.   

“As soon as I joined it, I felt so welcome,” Hoffman said. “Everyone is just so kind. I haven't really met a mean person, and I think we're all getting better at communicating on the field and getting to know each other more even helps just playing together.”  

Robles-Magallanes said her favorite part of the team is during the games on the weekends. 

“At tournaments, during halftime, we play, ‘This is IU (Indiana),’ like the song, and we just have a little dance break,” Robles-Magallanes said. “It's really good for morale, and it's just a really good time to just, in that moment, we are on a team, but we're also just, like being girls and having fun.” 

At their most recent tournament in Cincinnati, the Janes won two out of six games.  

The team isn’t really about the frisbee, Humphries said. It’s not really about winning either. It’s about community.  

“At the end of the day if my rookies are having fun, I’m happy and I hope that they’re happy,” Humphries said “I just want someone to have an outlet, to be able to just go and play a game outside.”