Estle said that just two sports governing bodies in Alaska have the Arctic Winter Games as a priority — cross-country skiing and alpine skiing. Those governing bodies select teams based on a series of competitions and pass the list on to Estle. For the rest of Team Alaska’s 375-member contingent, Estle said, he relies on volunteer coordinators and a variety of team selection methods.

“For example, in badminton, there’s more badminton activity in Fairbanks than in other places, so I find a person in Fairbanks who is interested and wants to put a team together,” Estle said.

In badminton, a team was selected during a qualifying tournament in Fairbanks.

Other sports, such as hockey and figure skating, hold tryout sessions. There were hockey tryouts in Fairbanks, Anchorage and Soldotna, while figure skating had just one tryout in Anchorage.

Some teams are selected by an application process. Prospective athletes submit an application and recommendations from coaches, and the sport coordinator or team coach is tasked with evaluating the athlete in person, if possible, or on videotape.

Deb Lowney of Homer, girls basketball coach for Team Alaska, said it’s difficult to select a team. Lowney is coaching in the Games for the fourth time, so she’s made quite a few contacts in the basketball community.

“It’s very, very difficult. That’s why I put a lot of weight on being able to see them personally, and a lot of weight on coaches’ recommendations,” Lowney said.

Lowney said she also considers how thoroughly and conscientiously a prospective athlete fills out her paperwork.

Lowney also said that because the Games compete with the Alaska high school season, the basketball teams are usually made up of freshmen — players that aren’t essential to their prep teams for the conference tournaments. Even in hockey, where the high school season is over before the Games, Estle said inevitably there’s a conflict with a tournament Outside.

“Kids are focused on their school teams, so unless their coach is talking about it, they’re not focused on participation (in the Games),” Lowney said.

Team Alaska also has a “postal” tryout for snowshoeing in which an athlete sets up a course according to regulations, records his or her times and mails the results to the sport coordinator.

“So there’s a broad variety of ways, from a single one-shot deal, to a statewide series, regional tryouts with regional quotas, an application process and the postal way,” Estle said.

“It all depends, but what really makes it work are the volunteer sport coordinators who accept responsibility to name coaches and athletes. The sport coordinators are the ones who make it happen.”

Estle compared Alaska’s team selection method to the Canadian teams that attend the Games.

“They have pretty strong territorial and provincial governing bodies. What they are able to do is tell their governing bodies, ‘This is what’s happening,’ then those bodies do the selection for coaches and athletes,” Estle said.

Coaching the team also is a challenge. In most sports, teammates introduce themselves in the locker room about 20 minutes before the first competition. One of the reasons the Alaska delegation has pushed for a double round robin before the medal round instead of a single round robin is to give its teams a little more time to gel before the medal games.

“It’s important to get a lot of games in before the medal round,” Estle said.

This year, with most of her team coming from the peninsula and Matanuska-Susitna Borough, Lowney said she was able to schedule a practice in Homer prior to the games.

“It will give them an opportunity to meet each other, and an opportunity for me to see how they gel as a team. It’s a huge advantage to be able to do that, instead of figuring it out in 20 minutes,” Lowney said.