In a bye weekend for Bulldog football, a different kind of tribal warfare descended on the University in “Survival UGA,” the University Union’s version of the CBS reality TV show, “Survivor.”

Two teams of five students, divided into the Wahditah team and the Shuckie Duckies, spent the weekend camping at Legion Field and competing for free textbooks next semester.

From the start, the contestants knew their success would depend on the building — and breaking — of alliances.

“My strategy is that once I build some friendships I’m gonna have to stab them in the back so I can win,” said Shannon Banks, a freshman from Cartersvillle and member of the Shuckie Duckies. “It’s so much easier to have people think I trust them and then cut them.”

Daisy Nehl, a junior from Columbus, said there was a potential for alliances to form based on the makeup of the teams.

“On one team there are three guys, and on the other there are three girls,” she said. “I don’t know who that puts at a disadvantage if the girls want to gang up on somebody.”

Team Wahditah took the first two reward challenges but lost two immunity challenges, forcing them to vote off four members.

Timo Rasmussen, a senior from Conyers, and Jennifer Morgan, a senior from Jackson, were the first two voted off.

“The voting made perfect sense,” Rasmussen said. “The two girls, who are the weakest members of our team, voted against me. And Todd (Hoskins) switched his vote and eliminated the biggest threat he saw — me.

“Todd played me, basically,” he said. “He played me, and he’s playing the game.”

“If karma’s a boomerang, it’s about to come back around,” Morgan said.

Hoskins, a junior from Dacula, and Shelarese Ruffin, a senior from Atlanta, were the next members of Wahditah eliminated.

“I feel a little betrayed, but I saw it coming,” Hoskins said. “I screwed Shelarese, so I had it coming.”

Ruffin said her elimination was “not unexpected. I knew everybody had turned (on each other) by the time I got to the stage.”

Nehl won the next two immunity challenges. At the third Tribal Council, Kellie Gerbers, a freshmen from Marietta, and Amanda Laird, a freshman from Omaha, Neb., were eliminated.

Gerber’s elimination came after she lost a tie-breaker with Patrick Hill, a senior from Augusta. Each received three votes.

Gerber said she believed her defeat was because Taylor Stanfill, a sophomore from Marietta, changed his vote.

“Taylor turncoated,” she said. “That’s the way the game is played, but he’s got to be careful whose toes he steps on.”

Banks was eliminated at the next Council. Hill said he believed it was because of the breaking up of a “freshman alliance” between Banks, Laird and Gerbers.

“Their alliance bit them in the ass and we just had to finish the job,” he said.

At press time Sunday, the three remaining contestants were Nehl, Stanfill and Hill. A Tribal Council Sunday night at 10 p.m. determined the final two contestants.

The last six contestants eliminated will return as jurors to the final Tribal Council on Friday at Dawgs After Dark.

– Contributing reporting by Dan Pye and Chantal Stepney