Who doesn’t love football season? The student section is roaring, the cheerleaders are getting the school spirit up and the band is tooting and drumming their little hearts out – this is what most consider the epitome of high school. But what about sports we don’t talk about? We offer many sports, and yet the ones we hear about most are football and boys basketball. Let’s bring some highly deserved accolades to some unappreciated sports.
Cross Country
Could you imagine running for miles, miles and more miles, and you are hardly recognized by the student body you represent? Cross Country is not an easy sport and requires months of conditioning. “There are just so many more popular sports like football and soccer during the cross-country season, so we get overshadowed easily,” sophomore Aries Brown said. Brown claims that few hear about when individual runners make sectionals this year or the last. Somehow a sport you can spot running all around town can be often overlooked.
Bowling
Have you ever bowled? If not, then you might be surprised about how hard it is to knock all those pins down? It is not as easy as it looks. Roughly 100 million dollars in scholarships are unused every year due to lack of knowledge or access to certain sports. We are very fortunate to have access to a bowling program so students can rack up those scholarships in dwindling sports like bowling. This year for the first time ever, our girls bowling team went to sectionals which should be a pretty big deal to our school. Sophomore Paisley Leal said, “We get announced during PEP and stuff, but we don’t always get posted to social media like the other sports.” These girls are making school history and hardly anyone has heard about it.
Swimming
Whilst infamous enemies on the football field, Ottawa and LP have a co-op swim team together. Since the swim team practices in LaSalle, not many people in Ottawa know we have a swim team, and it certainly doesn’t help that the record board is shoved into a little corner in Kingman Lobby. Sophomore swimmer Addisyn Budnick said, “We win almost every meet we compete in, and we still have very little recognition while other sports who win less frequently have more fans and funding.” Swim Coach Robert McNally frequently states that he is very proud that both teams that are comprised of enemy high schools can get along so well with the constant support of one another and friendliness among the whole team, boys and girls.
Lady Pirates
Let’s face it, women’s sports on all levels are overshadowed by men’s. You can see it in the pros, the Olympics and even at our own school. People frequently pack the bleachers to watch the boys basketball games, which is arguably the most popular winter sport. However, you never see the same turnout for the girls team. Senior Mary Stisser said, “We won back-to-back regionals, which is pretty hard to do, but no one really mentioned it.” You can see this for several sports, baseball vs. softball, men’s soccer vs. women’s, even golf. It is so disrespectful to the athletes and team that have poured in hours of their life to accomplish what they have to not be recognized by the student body, and the school that they are representing.
Without support or knowledge of these teams, few people join year after year. If there aren’t enough participants, then the school cuts that sport. Get the word out about bowling, join cross country; these sports have so many great people apart of them and you never know what you will accomplish.
