By Maddie Rea and Alexandra Davis
Our school has a tennis team? Surprise ladies and gents, we do. Other sports tend to be taken more seriously at Batavia. When I tell people I play tennis, the response back is usually negative. They laugh or make jokes about how easy it is to play. In fact, tennis requires a lot more skill and accuracy than you might think. It’s a game of muscle memory and strategy, not to mention a ton of patience during long points and matches. An average tennis game goes on for around 1.5-2 hours. So why do some barely even consider it a sport? Why don’t we have a student section? Why is my mom the only one who comes to watch me play?
When you look near the courts at an average tennis match, there is probably three people watching that are not a) teammates or b) related to the person in some manner. It may seem like the parking lot is full, but then you realize there’s a varsity soccer game the same night. Think they are cheering for your awesome shot you just hit? Nope. That’s just the football players getting riled up at the practice fields next to us. I could tell you we have three players that won state and you wouldn’t even know I was lying…because you probably wouldn’t care.
So why then do people obsess over football and volleyball? Don’t go to the football games and people won’t understand why. They obsess over every little game, know all the players and the record, not to mention pay $20 for a pass and spirit wear to crowd the stands. If they care about these school sports why shouldn’t they care about the rest?
Tennis is actually a pretty exciting sport to watch; it isn’t golf. We wear spandex too, guys! Just under our skirts. But really. Tennis includes very interesting and entertaining grunts. Watching people grunt in tennis is one of the most entertaining events, especially when it’s completely unnecessary. Also, you see some whacky hairstyles. One team we played had a girl who had a bun and braid in at the same time! Who knew that was possible?
But really why don’t we have a student section for all of our sports? Do you know how much the other team would be intimidated if they walked up to a huge student section cheering? Well, actually it’s part of tennis rules that you can’t talk or yell or cheer during a tennis point, but still after that point is over you can throw down all you want.
While the season is ending, we still have conference and sectionals. Not to mention state (if we make it). Even if we did make it, you wouldn’t know. We don’t get on morning announcements, and our twitter page happens to be followed by mostly our team members and players from the years past. Compare our followers (225) to the fans of football (2,105). Now I’m not saying that tennis is as interesting or deserves to have more fans than football, but 2000 more fans? I’m not saying I’m surprised, but I’m mildly disappointed in the lack of school spirit for the other sports.
So next time you and your friends don’t have anything to do after school, a simple sentence like “Hey want to go watch the tennis match?” wouldn’t be a bad idea! You might get some weird looks and maybe even make some friends, especially with someone’s grandpa watching the meet. Tennis might not have much support, in fact right now all we have is this article (If this is allowed to be published), but you can help change that. Stop by, you might even enjoy it.