The varsity girls lacrosse team has recently gone undefeated in the regular season with wins over Wootton and Quince Orchard, teams the Bulldogs have not beaten in six years, but nobody seems to care. On the other hand, varsity football received praise from everybody even though they did not make the playoffs.

Wrestling players, tennis players, softball players, cheerleaders, and girls lacrosse players alike have gone through their practices and games with no recognition from others, while players on football, boys lacrosse and boys basketball receive admiration for their daily routine.

Teams do not get enough credit for their hard work because of the lack of fans filling the seats. Unlike football, boys basketball and boys lacrosse, the only people who come to these understated games are parents of the athletes. This means that there are no loud students cheering on their team and frustrating the opponent.

There have been efforts made to increase support for lesser appreciated teams. “Super fans,” students who attend every game for one sport, cheered on the girls basketball team this year and got the team more focused on the game. These “super fans” are a step in the right direction for equal appreciation of all teams and should continue to more sports next year.

In order to get more fans to come to the games, the teams in need of a crowd should make events in the games that may attract other students to come and cheer on the team.

For example, this year the CHS hockey team put posters around the school in order to grab people’s attention and draw people to the games. The games were packed with people and it helped the players perform better knowing they had the support of their school behind them.

Lowered ticket prices, bake sales, advertisements or raffles are other ways to raise ticket sales and encourage the team to perform better. If ticket prices lowered from $5 an adult to $2, more people would come to watch the game because everybody would be able to afford a ticket. If teams hosted bake sales at the games, people would arrive at the game earlier so they could enjoy brownies and cookies before they run out. Advertisements on Bulldog TV would make everyone inside a classroom aware of the game and who is playing. Raffles are also a great way to encourage fans to come to games because fans want to win prizes. At the intramural basketball championship game, hundreds of fans packed the seats not only to see the top two teams battle it out, but also for a chance to win Popeyes and Chick-fil-a.

Until many of these ideas become reality, these teams and players will not get the credit necessary for their work.