Sports in New England the New England Dragway facility in Epping, New Hampshire as one of the very few remaining dragstrips in the New England region. Additionally, four colleges compete at the Division I level in ice hockey only: American International and Bentley College compete in the Atlantic Hockey Association, while Merrimack and the University of Massachusetts-Lowell compete in Hockey East and America East in the second half of 2013. Sports in New England Two popular American sports were invented in New England. Basketball was invented by James Naismith in Springfield, Massachusetts, in 1891. Volleyball was invented by William G. Morgan in Holyoke, Massachusetts,
James Dyer Ball James Dyer Ball James Dyer Ball (波乃耶) (4 December 1847 in Canton, China – 22 February 1919 in London, England) was a Hong Kong scholar and author born in Canton. He is noted for works on Chinese culture and for contributing to the development of the system of Cantonese Romanisation. Ball was the son of the Reverend Dyer Ball of Massachusetts, United States, and his much younger second wife, Scottish missionary Isabella Robertson. Apart from preaching, his father ran a dispensary and opened a school in Canton, Guangzhou. At age 7, Ball's family began three years of travel in Britain