Football at NC State, or pretty much any college, is a huge deal on Saturdays. Thousands of people gather together to tailgate, to drink, to watch the band and the cheerleaders and the dancers. It’s more like a party than anything else. It’s a tradition that’s been around for more than 100 years.
Watching a baseball game is an “American pastime,” and people make a habit out of going to these games because it has always been an activity that people have taken part in. The first NC State baseball game was played in 1894. The craziness of basketball season and intense rivalries increases the interest for people which makes them want to go to the games and participate in the excitement. All of these sports have been male-dominated since they’ve been popular.
On the other hand, women’s sports have only been around and widely popular since President Richard Nixon passed Title IX in 1972 which ensured women protection against “being excluded from participation in… any education program or activity receiving federal financial assistance.” In 1971, there were about 310,000 women participating in high school and college sports, but in 2012, more than 3,373,000 women participated in these sports.
The reason that women’s sports may be lacking as much excitement or attention isn’t because they’re less talented than men’s sports teams. In fact, the NC State women’s soccer team is 8-3-1 while the NC State men’s soccer team is 4-4-1. The women’s basketball team for 2016-2017 was 23-9 while the men’s basketball team for 2016-17 was 15-17.
Ingrained in American culture are playing and watching sports, but since women’s sports have not been around or respected for as long as men’s sports, that kind of excitement has never caught on with popular culture.
Yes, it’s super sexist and ridiculous that women weren’t able to seriously play sports until much later in American history, but the fact that most people don’t attend women’s sporting events isn’t because they are women; it’s because there’s just not enough hype surrounding these events.
The first men’s football game at NC State was played in 1892, and the first men’s basketball game was played in February 1911. However, the first women’s sport to surface in the NC State sports’ history was the women’s basketball team in 1974. The men’s teams have been around for many years, so there’s been plenty of time to build traditions and extra events around them. There just hasn’t been enough time for tradition and cultural hype around women’s sports.
I’m sure if tailgating was associated with women’s soccer or softball or volleyball, there would be a larger number of fans flocking to these events. If the dancers and cheerleaders were making appearances and performing at women’s sporting events, or even less popular men’s sports, more fans would come to those games. The band does perform at women’s basketball games and other events if the athletics department asks them to do so, however.
Over time, as women’s sports become more recognized and mainstream, I think it will attract more fans to sporting events, here at State and around the country, but until different traditions and activities become attached to women’s sports, not a lot of people will be interested. It’s more likely that the phenomenon of having more attendance at men’s sports games compared to women’s sports games is a cultural thing, rather than anything related to discrimination.
Women’s sports here at State have shown a record to be extremely successful, and I really hope sometime in the near future they will gain the hype that football and men’s basketball receive.
