NorthWest Cricket League brings the sport home

If you’ve found yourself driving along 128th Street east of I-5 in south Everett on a weekend, chances are you’ve witnessed an unusual sight while passing McCollum Park.

You’ve probably seen men in sports uniforms spread around a grassy field, and in the middle there appeared to be something akin to a baseball showdown between a pitcher and batter. However, this looked nothing like what you see at T-Mobile Park. And if your windows were open, you may have heard shouts of excitement and encouragement in a mix of English and any number of Asian dialects.

Welcome to the NorthWest Cricket League, where those who play a sport uncommon in the United States find their outlet.

“It’s really great to see that there is a sport that we can participate in that we grew up playing in our home country,” said Amit Thakur, a 32-year-old Snohomish resident and native of India who serves as the NorthWest Cricket League’s operations manager. “It’s a great pleasure, and for me it’s a pleasure to be part of actually seeing it growing.”

So what is cricket? Cricket is a sport that originated in England and resembles baseball: Games consist of innings, there are batters, runs are scored and batters make outs. However, there are important differences. The player who delivers the ball to the batter is called a bowler instead of a pitcher, and the ball arrives at the batter on a bounce. Instead of home plate, the bowler is aiming at something called a wicket, which consists of three 28-inch wooden poles stuck in the ground with a pair of small pegs suspended between them at the top. The bat has a flat striking surface instead of the round surface of a baseball bat. There’s no foul territory, with fielders having to catch the ball with their bare hands rather than using a glove. And one inning can consist of hundreds of runs and last several hours.

The sport is most popular in Great Britain and countries that were colonized by the British in the 18th and 19th centuries, such as Australia, New Zealand and South Africa — and especially in south Asian countries such as India, Pakistan, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka.

“In India, (cricket) is really big, man,” Thakur said. “Think about American football. It’s on the same scale.”

The NWCL, which consists of 41 teams spread across five divisions in its T20 league and includes nearly 1,000 players, is comprised mostly of immigrants from south Asian countries who grew up playing the sport in their home nations. Thakur estimated that 70 percent of the league’s players came to the region as part of the tech industry boom that’s taken place the past decade — Microsoft has four teams in the league, and Thakur himself is a software engineer at Amazon. While one finds the occasional Brit or Australian participant, the league is almost entirely made up of players from south Asia.

“Honestly speaking, I never thought when I was flying to the U.S. from India that I would be playing cricket at this level,” said Harish Prabhakar, a 35-year-old Microsoft employee who is the captain of the Bellevue Strikers team that defeated the Bellevue Blasters at McCollum Park on Aug. 17. “I knew from a few friends in New Jersey, Dallas (and) California that there are facilities for cricket there, but I never thought they would have them here, so I was glad to know that. It’s been a great experience playing in the league.”

While the NWCL is concentrated largely in the Puget Sound region, its borders extend across the state, with teams based in Bellingham, Spokane, Pullman and even one in Oregon. There are 20 grounds that host NWCL matches, and they have to be configured specifically for cricket, as the bowling area must be prepped so that the ball bounces properly. Two of the grounds are located in Snohomish County: McCollum Park and Forsgren Park in north Bothell.

The league, which has been around for two decades and has grown steadily over that time, runs from April through October. It’s organized into tiers, with the top level of competition being Division A, and teams can move through the divisions via promotion or relegation based on how they perform during the season.

Considering the league is amateur, the level of competition is strong. All the league’s players have prior cricket experience, and Thakur said the league includes some players who used to be members of the U.S. national cricket team. The league puts together an all-star team each year to play in a tournament in the Los Angeles area, which Thakur said the NWCL entrant won a couple years back.

“This is no less than playing in national-level cricket back in India, if I were to compare it,” Prabhakar said of the level of competition in the NWCL. “People play at school level, national level and international level. This is nowhere near international level, but at the national level it’s definitely close to that.”

And thanks to the NWCL, people from those countries are able to get a taste of their own sporting culture, right here in the Pacific Northwest.

If you have an idea for a community sports story, email Nick Patterson at npatterson@heraldnet.com.