Spirit is more than just sports

By Kurt Wagner

With school spirit so closely linked to athletic success, the struggles of the men's basketball team this season have provided student groups with challenges in generating excitement for sporting events and other activities.

"Students are not going to show up to games if (the teams) don't at least give the fans some satisfaction that they can win at home," said Ruff Riders President Denise Zafra.

As the men's team currently sits in the WCC cellar at 9-15 overall with only one conference win, some students feel the lack of a dominant athletic program at Santa Clara plays a major role in the prominence of school spirit.

"It's hard to become passionate about something when you don't necessarily have a huge driving force," said Sarah Beauchamp, the community development vice president of Associated Students.

Beauchamp, who helped put on this year's Bronco Week, came from a high school where spirit was powered by a respected football program, a rallying point Santa Clara doesn't currently have, she said.

In order to persuade students to attend basketball games, the Ruff Riders typically provide fans with free pizza and coupons for free concessions.

Additionally, in order to obtain a ticket to this year's St. Mary's game, Ruff Riders had to attend the San Diego game two nights earlier. The San Diego contest marked the largest Ruff Rider crowd in school history, with over 1,150 students in attendance.

"We're trying to draw people into the game where it's not what people would normally go to," said Zafra. "It's not St. Mary's or Gonzaga."

Todd Lane, the university events manager for the Activities Programming Board, pointed out that other athletic programs have been successful this year including men's water polo, women's club lacrosse and cross country. Yet, these sports lack student support.

"If you look at (spirit) in terms of students involvement and passion for their involvement then, yeah, we are on a very involved campus," Lane explained. "In terms of athletic support, no."

Although traditionally school spirit is associated with athletic success and turnout at major sporting events, a number of student leaders on campus feel that the term "spirit" can be defined in other ways as well.

"School spirit for me," said Zafra, "means that you're proud to support the organizations, the clubs and what your peers are fighting for in a sense."

Lane agrees.

"There is a ton of spirit on Santa Clara's campus in terms of students desires to get involved," he said. "I feel like for a lot of people that just kind of gets overlooked as just something that we do here, but in a sense, that really is a lot of school spirit."

This past week, student groups across campus collaborated to put on Santa Clara's third annual Bronco Week in an attempt to encourage student involvement and spirit at Santa Clara.

Events included Dormal Formal, a mechanical bull on Graham lawn, Bronco Wars and of course, the men's basketball game against Gonzaga.

Beauchamp said that this year's focus was to provide students with opportunities that were not directly related to athletics.

"If you're not an athlete or if you can't go to games or if that's not your thing there's a whole bunch of other ways that Santa Clara students can get involved on campus and show their school spirit," she explained.

Other changes to the Bronco Week layout for this year included an effort to provide free services to students, especially during tough economic times. Attendance at events like Dormal Formal was much higher than last year's Red and White Ball with over 350 students attending due in large part to the absence of an entry fee, said Beauchamp.

Although the events went off without a hitch and student participation was up, Lane felt the week blended in with all of the other events held around campus on a regular basis.

"It's just another thing that's going on," he said. "I think the overlying goal of Bronco Week is to increase school spirit. Did it do that? I don't know. That's a hard thing to measure."

Beauchamp hopes that Bronco Week will be a stepping-stone to encouraging students to stay involved all year long, regardless of whether or not we have a successful basketball program.

She said: "Students who are more involved, show more school spirit."

Contact Kurt Wagner at jwagner@scu.edu or (408) 554-4546.