Teams made up of members from the Panhellenic Council and the Interfraternity Council will compete in a dodgeball tournament to raise money for prostate cancer research.

Pi Lambda Phi fraternity is hosting the first annual tournament, which will take place in the East Middle School at 167 Frederick St., Binghamton from 1:45 to 6:30 p.m. Saturday.

Teams consisting of five to six players, with five on the court at any given time, paid a registration fee of $60. Non-participants will be charged an entrance fee of $3. These fees will grant the payer access to all of the raffles that will take place throughout the tournament. At time of print, the specific number and prizes of raffles was unknown.

The teams will consist of members of the same sorority or fraternity, and the sororities will play each other while the fraternities compete against other fraternities.

The money raised by the tournament will be donated to Integrated Medical Foundation, an organization that aims to improve health care through patient education and community outreach.

“[IMF] provides education and support along with doing research to find a cure for prostate cancer,” co-coordinator of the event, Brian Equinda, a senior majoring in history, said. “Prostate cancer is something that has begun to be found in many males of our parents’ generation and is a problem of growing concern.”

According to Brian Goldwasser, a junior majoring in finance and the philanthropy chair of Pi Lambda Phi, the fraternity decided to make the event a dodgeball tournament because it is a sport both guys and girls would enjoy.

“The turnout has looked good so far,” Goldwasser said. “We think we will end up with between eight to 10 girls’ teams and over 10 guys’ teams.”

Dodgeball teams, which will include members from all six Panhellenic sororities and a majority of the more than 15 IFC fraternities, were introduced to the event by Pi Lambda Phi members and event coordinators Goldwasser, Equinda and Josh Rabbiner, a sophomore majoring in psychology.

The tournament will be played in a double-elimination bracket style, meaning that a team with two losses loses the tournament as a whole. The losing team will then be moved to the “losers’ bracket.” If the team loses once more while in the losers’ bracket, it will be out of the tournament.

Prizes will be given to the first- and second-place teams.

“There are prizes for the winners and runners-up for both the guys and girls, as well as raffles going on throughout the tournament for the spectators,” Goldwasser said. “The prizes are going to be decided soon, but they will pretty much consist of multiple gift certificates to various restaurants and bars — gift certificates can only be used for food and non-alcoholic beverages.”

The businesses in the Binghamton community are supporting the philanthropy event by providing the gift certificates for the prizes and raffles.