The Alaska Baseball League (www.alaskabaseballleague.org) consists of six semiprofessional teams: Mat-Su Miners, Kenai Peninsula Oilers, Alaska Goldpanners of Fairbanks, Anchorage Bucs, Anchorage Glacier Pilots, and Fairbanks Athletes in Action. The teams include talented college players from throughout the country who come to Alaska to play in June and July. Alaska Baseball League teams play each other, along with Outside teams from the West Coast and Hawaii, with the top teams ending up at the National Baseball Congress World Series in Wichita, Kansas. Alaskan teams have won these World Series many times, and quite a few famous players have spent a summer on Alaska turf, including Mark McGwire, Tom Seaver, Graig Nettles, and Dave Winfield.

Hockey is very big in Alaska, especially in Anchorage and Fairbanks, where overachiever dads push their kids onto the ice by age four. The Alaska Aces (www.alaskaaces.com) play professional hockey in the minor-league West Coast Hockey League, and both the University of Alaska Anchorage (UAA) and the University of Alaska Fairbanks (UAF) have nationally competitive hockey teams.

In bush Alaska, no sport is bigger than basketball, and any visitor who can play well stands a good chance of immediately being accepted by the locals. There’s intense competition among high school teams at the state level, and both UAA and UAF have their own basketball squads. The state’s biggest basketball event is the Great Alaska Shootout held in Anchorage each November and featuring eight college teams.