Beginning of the MBA World Cricket??

By now I’ve explained what cricket is way too many times to start doing it again here … refer to http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cricket for more on that. You probably know what MBA and World mean. So let’s talk about the beginning …

In early May, Fuqua (I will credit them to be the founders to MBA World Cricket) reached out to us to start the first ever inter-MBA cricket tournament. We had just concluded the Darden first year vs second year cricket game, with the first years emerging victorious in a close game. I was excited at the idea but since we were nearing the end of first year and heading out to internships we promised to co-ordinate over the summer and making it happen early fall.

Over the summer we scheduled a triangular tournament for Sept 5th in Durham between Darden, Fuqua and Kenan-Flagler. However, Kenan-Flagler cited difficulty in forming a team due to smaller size of cricket-playing community and pulled out soon. Back at Darden, we were planning to redraft the team to include fresh first year students. At the very first TNDC (Thursday Night Drinking Club), Laura Pearson (our President) told me that it’s possible for us to get funding from school if organize trials open to everyone at Darden. I was excited at the opportunity to raise awareness for the game on campus. The trials were well attended by experienced cricketers as well as people who wanted to learn the game. Given the high degree of interest, I corresponded with Fuqua to see if each of us could field two teams. The purpose of B team was to give interested people an opportunity to experience a game setting. We shortened the format of the games to have enough time for driving down and playing the two games, Darden A vs Fuqua A and Darden B vs Fuqua B.

On game day, 22 players and 5 supporters carpooled for a 3 hour drive down to Durham. Darden sported whites, while Fuqua wore blue. The A teams squared-off first, followed by the B teams. Darden A beat Fuqua A convincingly, while Darden B showed considerable grit while going down against Fuqua B. Personally, the results were really secondary to the fact that we were using cricket as a platform to interact across schools. However, we had some really passionate kids on the teams and we always had it at the back of our minds that we’re representing Darden.

The Darden Huddle

Below are highlights from the games: Fuqua A 115 all out in 15 overs (Navin 46, Shweth 27, Nishant 3/30) lost to Darden A 116/5 in 10.2 overs (Sameer Sayed 51 not out, Ankush Kaul 22, Divye Rawat 2/19)

The Victorious Darden A Team

Darden B 110 all out in 13.3 overs (Suprajj Papireddy 46, Puvi 3/20) lost to Fuqua B 111/6 in 13.4 overs (Prashant 35 not out, Naresh Kanyal 3/18)

The Darden B Team

(Pictures Courtesy Sania Chaudhry)

At this point, I would like to mention my appreciation towards Jeff Peo and Elvis Rodriguez for taking up the challenge and performing well for the A and B teams respectively. And a special thanks to our supporters who followed us to Durham to cheer the team.

It was a great experience interacting with the Fuqua community. In the Spring of 2010, we plan to invite Fuqua and a few other east coast schools for a bigger event at Darden. We’re all excited about it. This could very well be beginning of the MBA World Cricket!

Where's the summer at?

We’re back at Darden, as Second Years this time around. Getting used to coming to school at our own sweet time, being senior members of the Darden community, and always finding the café and learning team rooms occupied. I am loving it except that the summer seems to have been curtailed by school, the stretch of recent cold days hasn’t helped either.

I loved the flexibility I enjoyed this summer, spending most of my time working remotely as a strategy consulting associate. I would have loved to be somewhere other than Charlottesville for the summer, but overall the last few months turned out pretty well for me.

My first non-engineering experience happened to be the development of an international market-entry strategy for a consumer products company. It was great to get an insight into how consulting works, particularly the softer, psychological aspect that we encounter once we go past the hypotheses and the analyses.

I got to meet and experience the Charlottesville locals that come out in droves during the summer, the only time when UVA students retreat, to enjoy this beautiful town. It’s sunny, there’s great food, great music and sports. Talking of sports, I finally got around to learning golf at the Meadowcreek. I was happy that I was hitting pretty well, 300+ yard drives on the very first day, till a buddy pointed out 'drive for show, putt for dough'. Putting is indeed harder than it looks!

My weekends were relatively free and I used them to play cricket. I love this sport – the sound of leather on willow tingles my bones – and I thought I had retired when I came to b-school. But I was back, I travelled all over, enjoyed every bit of it. I am grateful but I don’t think I am done with the sport yet. The very few weekends I was around in Charlottesville were occupied by hikes, the water hole at Sugar Hollow is my favorite. Again this is beautiful country and I had spent too much time in the learning team rooms!

And I did have a resolution for the summer. Towards the end of the school year a bunch of us were looking at the pictures from the International Food Festival last October and each of us had a common observation. We had all gained serious weight while at Darden but I wanted to look and feel like I did before I got to Darden. My summer schedule allowed me to eat well and work myself into leanness.

While I was at it, I also unleashed the reader in me who has been pretty dormant of late. Read a book a week, The White Tiger by Aravind Adiga was the pick of the season. At the end of it all, I felt refreshed and recharged.

The first year has flown by and the new year beckons. All I know is soon I will be out of school for good. The next mission is to get a job and enjoy every minute of what’s left of my Darden-career.