Student Section

Story by Fabian Rosales »

Almost every sport has a dedicated student section cheering them on. Although sometimes, cheering can go too far. Recently, our student section has been receiving a lot of complaints from different schools. Most of these complaints revolve around Eudora student’s behavior at volleyball games. Where’s the line between school pride and being disrespectful? Noah Katzenmeier Sr., has been to quite of a few volleyball games and he heard quite of  a few rude things coming from the student section.

“The most recent game I went to was substate when they were playing Miege,” Katzenmeier said. “I heard a few people yell the words faggot, and when a  girl missed a serve someone yelled, ‘what are you a, faggot.’”

Nate Gomez Sr., who helps lead the student section, explained that we had issues of students being disrespectful at volleyball games, and not so much football games.

Last year a student was banned from all of the away basketball games. Some students were yelling obscene things at the players on the other team. This happened again this year, but at volleyball games. Anna Dixon, who attends Louisburg High School, said that she heard our student section yelling inappropriate things at her and her teammates.

“Many of the students tried to ask me how tall I was and stuff while I was serving… which is pretty unsportsmanlike.” Dixon said.

Dixon also remembers comments that were made by students from Eudora about her friend, those were even worse.

“When my teammate was serving they were making negative comments about her body which made her start crying on the court,” Dixon said.

The students were not just shouting at two people, but to everyone who was serving. Dixon explained that shouting things at the setter, especially about their appearance, is disrespectful.

“Having bad sportsmanship and targeting players about their appearance or bad play is disrespectful.” said Dixon.

It’s important to have school spirit, but it’s also important to not be rude to the other team. Especially to the team members.

“All it takes one or two people to ruin a group,” said Cara Kimberlin, Athletic Director at Eudora High School.

She also explained how important it is for the seniors to set a good example for the underclassmen when it comes good sportsmanship.

“If you get the seniors to do it, it’ll spread to the underclassmen,” said Kimberlin.

Yelling rude comments at other team, and the players, doesn’t only reflect poorly on the student section, but on the the school in general. As we start basketball season, it’s important to remind our student section how to practice good sportsmanship.

“I don’t have any worries for basketball,” said Kimberlin. “I’ll need to talk to the leaders of the student section to remind them how to act.”

“If a student feels like they need to make fun a player, they don’t need to be there,” Kimberlin said. “The purpose of a student section is to support their own teammates.”