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It was only a matter of time before American Ninja Warrior tapped into college rivalries, which is exactly what the franchise did with the spin-off Team Ninja Warrior: College Madness. ?The series, which premieres on Tuesday on the Esquire Network, will run for five episodes and be a team-based obstacle course competition featuring undergraduate and graduate students racing head-to-head.Whereas American Ninja Warrior is strictly individuals, Team Ninja Warrior pits teams of three (two men, one woman) against each other in a race of speed and agility. There are upper-body tests on the course, but the Team Ninja Warrior courses are about who can finish the fastest, rather than if an athlete can finish at all. This makes for a completely different environment for athletes and viewers alike.College Madness is a new twist on a previously successful formula for Esquire, which spawned Team Ninja Warrior last year. As Ninja Warrior becomes more popular, it wouldnt be a stretch for college students to be familiar with it, but that certainly wasnt the case for all of the women competing on the forthcoming show.It wasnt on my radar, contestant Melissa Hill said in a recent phone interview. Hill, 22, who is originally from Sorrento, Florida, is a University of Florida graduate student and competitive climber. Hill joined Floridas team at the behest of her teammates and fellow climbers, Dane Brooks and Garrison Kalvin.My first thought was ... No way would we ever get on this show, Hill said with a laugh. She applied with Brooks and Kalvin, and the rest is history.Ninja Warrior, however, was most definitely on the radar of Emma Beserra, 19, a power lifter and TCU student. My whole family watches it, she said over the phone.Originally from The Woodlands, Texas, Beserra was a competitive cheerleader throughout high school, and in college she started to lift and do other forms of fitness. Shes been on TV before as well, having run the BattleFrog College Championship, which aired on ESPNU and ESPN2. At TCU, Beserra works at the rec center, and unlike Hill she did not know her teammates well prior to the show.We didnt meet them until we got to school, and we had to fly out [to Los Angeles] the next week, Beserra noted.Though not thought of as a traditional background sport for ninjas, cheer has strong representation in this first episode of College Madness. University of Georgia student Victoria Case,19, is a former cheerleader for the Bulldogs, as is fellow UGA competitor Doug Legg. She also played softball and rode horses when she was younger. The fashion merchandising major and Georgia native also noted that she is a die-hard [Bulldogs] sports fan.Hill, who is studying ecology, started climbing just after matriculating at the University of Florida. She grew up playing golf but doesnt consider herself a traditional sports fan. Im sports indifferent, she said. After realizing that she didnt want to play golf in college, Hill had a hole in her life that she ended up filling with climbing.Fun was something I had been missing in golf, because I was burnt out on it, Hill said.As with climbing, pole vaulting has a reputation within the ninja community for spawning successful competitors, especially women. ANW superstar Jessie Graff pole vaulted at Georgia Tech and the University of Nebraska. Fellow ninja Meagan Martin was a pole vaulter at Vanderbilt. Cassie Craig, who is an up-and-coming female ninja, was also a pole vaulter.?Haley Houston,19, a sophomore at the University of Houston, hopes to join that legacy. The Austin, Texas, native is studying kinesiology and wants to be a physical therapist. She started pole vaulting in middle school, which is relatively rare, as not many middle schools have pole vaulting programs, and she still vaults at Houston. Coincidentally, she also participated in cheerleading.Houston watched American Ninja Warrior previously but did not have plans to try to get on one of the shows.It was an accident, she said in a phone interview.Houston was inadvertently recruited by her teammate and ninja enthusiast Zach Tamayo while working at the campus recreation center. He told Houston about how he needed a woman to compete on his team, and she volunteered. It was as simple as that. Houston was familiar with the kinds of obstacles on the show and figured she could do well.Obstacles, however, can be harder than they appear. This is really, really hard, Houston added.And that they are. The show promises to bring the same level of intensity to the competition as ANW, with a dash of that old college try!Team Ninja Warrior: College Madness premieres on Esquire Network on Tuesday at 8 p.m. ETBaltimore Orioles Shirts . -- The Magic have their first victory of the new year. Baltimore Orioles Pro Shop . Q: Team Canada announces their Olympic roster three weeks from today. Who is general manager Steve Yzerman watching? LeBrun: Over the last 48 hours, hes taken in the home-and-home between the Dallas Stars and Colorado Avalanche with Jamie Benn and Matt Duchene being the obvious targets. https://www.cheaporioles.com/ . Parker had 26 points and eight assists and San Antonio beat Toronto 112-99 Monday night. "We won that game because of Tony Parkers aggressiveness," Spurs coach Gregg Popovich said. "His juice; his aggression all night long. Baltimore Orioles Gear . Laudrup revealed Thursday he was notified of his dismissal in "the briefest of letters which gave no reasons why such hasty and final action was deemed necessary. Stitched Orioles Jerseys .C. United of Major League Soccer. United chose the defender in the second round of the 2013 MLS re-entry draft.Munster director of rugby Rassie Erasmus described the small details which things which made Saturdays visit of Glasgow difficult, a day after former captain Anthony Foley was laid to rest.As the European Champions Cup remembered Foley before all games this weekend, Munster supporters held aloft placards spelling out his jersey number and nickname AXEL. The name was sewn into the Munster players jerseys and afterwards Foleys sons, Tony and Dan joined the team on the field to sing Stand Up and Fight. It was an emotional day for all involved with Munster rugby. Their director of rugby included.The tough things are the small things, said Erasmus post match. You get into the bus to the field, Axels seat is there. You get into the changing room, all the little things that remind you.Then you get out to the field and the Munster people, the Irish people, do things that are very personal, with so much emotion and then I wasnt sure how that would impact on everyone, from the opposition to us, so I am relieved the guys handled it like that.On the field, players were overcome by emotion before and after tthe game as they sang the Munster anthem.ddddddddddddThe emotion carried over into an impressive performance on the field as Munster ran in five tries. Despite speaking to the players ahead of the game, Erasmus didnt know how the players would react to the loss of Foley.I feel relieved because of the unknown element about the week. The territory we got into this week and circumstances, different things, I did not know, myself, how we would react, how the players would react, even the referee or the opposition.It was such a weird week which you cant really prepare for. Even with the warm-up I wasnt even sure what we would get out of this. We had a good chat last night and this morning about what we were going to try and achieve, not even result-wise, but more the way we wanted to play.I was expecting that would come through, but not in such a mature way, for the players to do it so quickly after something tragic that happened to Axel (Anthony Foley), so I am relieved. ' ' '