Jam-packed into the stands and dressed head to toe in this week’s theme stands MN’s student section. As they proudly look on from the wooden bleachers of the Stable, the boys basketball team fiercely takes the court, getting ready for another big game. 

While the student section is now filled with deafening cheers and jumping students, just a few minutes before, our defending state girls basketball team finished an equally intense game with barely any students to cheer them on.

Although crowds and their high expectations can be seen as causing an immense amount of stress, this pressure can lead to motivation. This motivation then drives teams to play harder, leading to improvement in the success of their performance, commonly known as the “home court advantage.” 

The limited support for our Lady Mustangs is disheartening as they put in just as much time, effort, and practice as the boys team, in hopes of bringing home our second state title in girls basketball history. 

With little crowd support behind them, some athletes have become frustrated.

“It would be nice if the girls team would get a student section that doesn’t just sit at our game so they have a spot for the boys game! It helps when we have our school cheering for us too. We’re defending champs and still get little to no support,” senior forward Asia Bryant tweeted on Feb. 24. 

Keeping school tradition alive is important, but students shouldn’t rely solely on this year’s Hard Hat to lead chants and come to games. We all have to take responsibility and support all of our varsity teams equally.

Suggestions have been made to implement a female Hard Hat in order to drum up support for our girls teams, but some athletes are concerned this could cause problems between students as the school tradition changes.

With highly dominant girls sports programs capturing recent state titles in soccer, volleyball, and basketball, as well as three national titles in dance, change might be necessary. We should take baby steps first, working to improve our school spirit. 

While getting more people to attend games might be difficult initially, starting with getting athletes to support other athletes would be an excellent first step. Overcoming the overlook on girls sports would increase our school spirit dramatically, as a larger percentage of the school population would feel supported. 

If we continue down the path of our more recent attendance trends, growing support for all our athletes will become increasingly more difficult. As a collective student body, if we decide to equally support every team, we will not only help our athletes succeed, but also  continue to keep that “home court advantage” everywhere we go. 

With a bright future behind all our programs, deafening cheers and packed stands our bound to happen eventually. Breaking trends now would change history later and increase our school spirit drastically.