Local marbles shooters dominate again in national finals

Annika Goyal, 10, of Hampton, is skillful at shooting marbles — and writing about them:

“They clink like echoes lost in time, of childhood games and nursery rhymes, of sunlit fields and scraped-up knees, and laughter dancing on the breeze,” goes a verse in her poem, “Whispers of Marbles.”

She was one of three Allegheny County mibsters who excelled June 16-19 at the 102nd National Marbles Tournament in Wildwood, N.J., taking second place for girls ages 7-14.

The winner was Elise Peterson, 12, of the West End, who will receive a $2,000 college scholarship and be inducted next year into the National Marbles Hall of Fame, also in Wildwood. The boys runner-up was Dorian Marlowe, 10, of Reserve, continuing a strong showing for Pittsburgh area marbles shooters.

The Allegheny County team has had 35 winners at the National Marbles Tournament in the past 51 years.

Elise has been playing marbles for four years. She began when Ed Ricci, longtime coach of the Allegheny County team, came to her school, Pittsburgh Phillips K-5, during recess and taught the students how to play marbles.

She did well at school and taught her parents how to play at home, said her father, Andrew Peterson. They practiced with her and she was invited to compete in the Allegheny County competition, after which Ricci took over as coach.

Elise earned a spot in the Allegheny County Marbles Tournament, a prequalifier for the nationals, her very first year.

Members of the two area teams — Allegheny County and Pittsburgh — are all friends, Elise said. To become the 2025 national champion, she had to defeat Annika.

Elise said she didn’t care who won and that it was disappointing that one of them had to lose. “I wasn’t expecting to win,” she said.

Elise was expecting to only make the semi-finals, like she did last year.

“We joked around about how they were gonna, like, try and match each other point for point,” said her mother, Katie Peterson. “So they were gonna have to play all 15 games to figure out who got to eight first.”

Elise won the final match over Annika 8-5.

“I kept telling her right before she went to play that … either way, the trophy was going home to Allegheny County,” Ms. Peterson said.

“She beat some really excellent players this year to make it to [the] finals and then win. She didn’t get lucky. She definitely earned her place there.”

The game of marbles, also known as knuckleball, has hundreds of variations, Ricci said.

Here’s the way it’s played in the Allegheny County and National Marbles tournaments: Thirteen marbles are set up in a circle with an X in the middle. Players take turns shooting from outside the circle. If you hit a marble out and your shooter stays inside, you get to go again, shooting from where your shooter marble stopped. But if you miss or your shooter marble goes out, it’s the next player’s turn.

Dorian said his favorite part about playing marbles is getting a stick, which means knocking seven or more of the 13 marbles out before it’s the other players’ turn. That’s how Elise won the last game of the championship match, also earning an award for most sticks played.

Annika began playing in 2024 after her mom saw a Facebook post about Allegheny County marbles’ practice and decided to take her. She placed second in her first county competition. This year, after placing in the top eight at the Allegheny County competition, she qualified for the national tournament.

Annika did not play well on the first day of nationals, ending up near last place. But she gradually improved and qualified for the finals against Elise.

The night before the finals, it rained and Annika fell on wet pavement while playing, sustaining a fracture to her knee and a sprained ankle. Despite her injuries, she was pleased to make it to the national championship.

“I feel like every person has a different personality. So does every marble. It has a different story,” Annika said. “It’s the joy ... whenever you win a game. That joy ... it’s just the feeling that goes through your body.

“Coach Ed even says it’s almost like shooting a basketball. You have to be precise, you have to be focusing on one hoop, not both, or else you’ll give the other opponent more chances.”

Ricci said he teaches marbles the same way his grandfather taught him when he was young.

“My mother said she had pictures of me in diapers at Wildwood. My first year would have been [when I was] 3,” he said. “After that, I always helped my grandfather or my mother, and you know, just pretty much I’ve been going down there 50 plus years.”

Ricci’s family has led the Allegheny County team since the 1960s, when his grandfather, Walt Lease, was in charge.

Ricci said that his grandfather, a math teacher, never played marbles but loved kids. Using math to calculate the angles of the marbles, he found a way to teach the kids how to get better.

“It’s a lot more challenging than playing pool,” Ricci said. “Cue balls are 2¼ inches in diameter. Marbles, the targets, are ⅜ of an inch.”

In 1976, Americans ended the winning streak of the British in the World Marble Championship. Ricci believes his grandfather coached the team that won the championship. In the 1980s, his grandfather passed the Allegheny County marbles mantle to his daughter, Caroline, Ricci’s mom. His grandfather, a World War II veteran, died in 1995.

His family’s deep love for the game has passed through four generations, with his daughters, Amber and Sierra Ricci, winning national titles — Amber in 2008 and Sierra in 2017. Both continue to help teach kids with their dad when they can.

One of the reasons Ricci believes that it’s important to teach the game to kids is because “it shows them that if you work hard enough ... if you want it, you can win. You can earn it.”

Ricci said that he mostly focuses on teaching mibsters proper form. “It depends on each kid,” he said. “There is no wrong way.”

Though Allegheny County provides funding for its team, he also seeks sponsorships to cover the cost of competing.

“If it wasn’t for the sponsors, a lot of this would probably go away,” he said.

Teaching kids at local schools and parks like Pittsburgh Whittier K-5 in Duquesne Heights, Blessed Trinity Academy in Indiana Township and Stone Ridge Park in Shaler, Ricci makes the game accessible to kids across Allegheny County.

“It’s just rewarding seeing these kids set a goal, then accomplish it,” he said.

Ricci said there is a community within the game and that he renews friendships each year in New Jersey.

“It’s kind of like family, but instead of weddings and funerals, I see those same people every year down [at the] beach,” he said. “I’ve been seeing them my entire life.”

Since champions are not allowed to compete again in the national tournament, Elise said she is going to try to help Annika win next year’s tournament.

Annika’s mother, Sudiksha Goyal, explained that, in India, marbles is a traditional childhood game.

“Back in India, me and my husband used to play,” she said. “We [would] just go in our neighborhood, play with friends.”

Marbles was more like a hobby than a sport in India, she said. Learning how competitive it is around here is what inspired her to take Annika to her first practice last year.

Elise has this advice for aspiring mibsters: “If you’re playing marbles, try not to focus too much on shooting and like, stress about it. Just do it instead of overthinking it.”