We are red! We are white! We are dynamite!
But are we really “dynamite” when it comes to school spirit at basketball games? The only real way to explore it to see how the Red Sea stacks up against other groups of loud and intoxicated students.
Probably the best model for school spirit in the MAAC came last March as the conference championship rolled into Harbor Yard.
Fairfield had the biggest crowd, but then again the tournament was held five minutes away from our campus. It was another team that made a big impression on FUSA President Hutch Williams ’08.
“The group of students Marist brought had a strong impact,” said Williams. “We had the most students but Marist was definitely noticeable and loud.”
But what was the driving force behind the Red Foxes’ cunning trip to Bridgeport?
According to an article in The Marist Circle, Marist’s Student Government Association formed a student spirit committee last February that went to select games, including the MAAC tourney at Harbor Yard.
Only in March will we see if this streak continues for Marist. But they are not the only ones in the MAAC who are plagued with spirit problems.
In a past editorial, The Rider News cited the lack of a football team as the school’s biggest problem when it comes to school spirit. The Rider students are right. If you can pack a 40,000-seat stadium for a pigskin game, you’ve got yourself a college atmosphere.
Williams said, “Football is so college, but we have a sport equal to that in basketball.”
One thing Williams and I agreed on was that the better the team, the more students in attendance. The basketball teams are not quite there yet, but under Ed Cooley and Joe Frager they are on the right path. But it is a long path.
Step one is to win the MAAC. Step two: advance in the NCAA (even if it’s a game or two). Then do it again over a number of times over the span of say 10 years.
They could then move out of a mid-major conference to maybe the Big East.Enrollment would increase drastically, but then again, it is anyway. Maybe then we could put some pads on some students and draw 40,000 to a theoretical “Dolan Stadium.”
I don’t mean to put added pressure on our basketball teams, but look at some of the things the University wants:
Diversity. Selective admissions. Notoriety.
These things are by-products of success on the court and on the field. Even schools that were nobodies five years ago, such as South Florida, Boise State and George Mason, have been on the mouths of the sports bar elite.
This basketball season, with second-year and first-year coaches and a group of young talent, the men’s and women’s teams are sure to please. There is no doubt that at the end of the year and at the end of the rebuilding era, the basketball program will be getting two Stags way up.
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