The smell of sweat sprung from the team, as they slowly jogged off of the field. “Water!” They called out as they were exhausted from giving their all on the field, knocking down person after person trying to get to the ball. But somehow that was not enough, they were still down 0-21 and the crowd had lost hope and so did some of the players. Regardless of all the hard work everyone was putting into the game, everyone paid attention to the score and not so much the skill of the players.

“Everybody treats us like we’re not good,”says number 53 Tyquarius White. He believes the narrative that the Suncoast football team is bad is false and unfair to say. White thinks that maybe if there were more love for the team and less judgement that it may help boost the team’s confidence.

“A lot of people only care about winning, if you’re not winning people won’t care about you,” said White. Winning games should not determine whether or not the football team gets support. Where is the support? Where is the so-called charger spirit that we go around yelling in school. There are those on the team that lack of confidence and charisma. Without it, the games will continue to be played without heart and there will be less support on both ends.

Anthony Kaforous said that there are those with talent on the team but there is not enough experience for it to even make that much of a difference. Player number 55, Kaforous, believes that the lack of school spirit is not the reason they play poorly from time to time, it’s the lack of  confidence overall.“Although we’re conditioning, there are still a lot of inadequacies across the team,” senior Kaforous said.

Playing in an actual game the whole time playing both sides is not the same thing as conditioning at practice. It is harder and leaves room for more unwarranted mistakes. “We haven’t had a normal sports season in two years, this is the first year where everything is kind of going back to normal. There are fairly new players being put in positions they were never in before, having to play both ways because of a lack of players,” White said. There are just so many factors playing into the team’s performance. No one seems to pay attention to that part. School spirit isn’t just showing up to the game, it’s greeting the players in the hallways and defending their name. Suncoast as a school should not just be there for the congratulations, they should want to support them along the way.

“As the season progresses we do expect better results and I think a better turnout at the games will be much appreciated,” Kaforous said. Ian Smikle, basketball player, feels as though the football team just needs to rebuild and keep pushing. “I think more support and spirit is great because of the amount of people rooting for me and the team and that energy helps us do good,” He stated. School spirit is much appreciated and should be spread out amongst all sports especially the ones that need it the most.