EDITORIAL: Students need to attend more games
As students, it is important to us that we enjoy the overall environment of our university. And the level of school spirit present can undoubtedly help or hurt the student experience as a whole. Our school spirit should not positively or negatively correlate with the success of our sports teams, but should be present regardless of how our sports teams do. If we bring our Scarlet Knight pride to sports games, the popular and unpopular alike, it is not far fetched to think that not only will our teams succeed, but that we will begin to realize that school spirit has a special ability to bind us more closely together as a community.
With a record so far of 1-7, it is safe to say that Rutgers football team has had an unfortunate season, and the remainder of the fall is only likely to get worse. Our next four games are against powerhouses Wisconsin, the University of Michigan, Penn State and Michigan State, and being that a Rutgers win in one of the coming games is rather unlikely, it is not far fetched to think that the student section will have weak attendance — at least past halftime.
In the midst of all of the noise regarding Rutgers football’s lack of success, our other Scarlet Knight fall sports teams have, as usual, seemingly gone far too unnoticed. The field hockey team has a record of 13 wins and 5 losses and, achieving 9 shutouts, has won multiple games against ranked teams. The women’s soccer team has gone 11-3-5 this regular season, also with nine shutouts. Both teams finished the regular season nationally ranked. Yet there is a continual and noticeable lack of student attendance at both of these sports.
These teams have succeeded despite a lack of tangible support from their fellow Scarlet Knights, but they nonetheless deserve our student body’s care and attention. The only thing is, their games are for some reason not enticing enough to attract a significant amount of student interest. Football itself is one of the most popular sports in the nation, and here at Rutgers the football team remains the only sport that actually brings revenue to the University. But there still seems to be something valuable about showing support for teams other than football, which itself barely gets enough support. So with that said, it seems worth it to think about ways to make student attendance at sports games like field hockey and soccer more enticing.
Interestingly, it would make sense to say that one huge factor in garnering more interest in game attendance for a sport like field hockey would likely be if there were a large number of students already going. If students see their fellow classmates and friends interested in going to a certain game, they will probably want to attend as well — but how do we make that happen? The answer there is by no means simple, but it is clear that tailoring the environment of these games toward student-fans would help. For example, “the Alley” was a high energy and flat out fun environment for students.
The location of the games probably throws a wrench in the ability to increase student attendance. Games being on the Busch or Livingston campuses makes attending seem more like a burden than an exciting experience. But if somehow there were a game on the College Avenue campus, it might be reasonable to say that more students would show up for at least a little while. But, of course, given the setup of the College Avenue campus, games will have to continue to occur on the more remote campuses.
Our sports teams deserve our support, no matter how much money they bring to the University and no matter how much hype the University builds around them. If more students take the time to attend and understand the games of less popular sports at Rutgers, they will begin to feel themselves become more invested in them — especially if their fellow classmates are there cheering with them. In the future, we should bring our school spirit to our sports games, and not let the success of our teams dictate the level of our school spirit.
The Daily Targum's editorials represent the views of the majority of the 150th editorial board. Columns, cartoons and letters do not necessarily reflect the views of the Targum Publishing Company or its staff.
