Turnout was expected to be huge Friday, November 4, at the New Trier vs. St. Charles Varsity Football game. But it wasn’t. Only a few dozen students showed up to support their team at their second round playoff game.

After a record breaking year, where the Trevians broke Maine South’s 77 game winning streak in conference play, and the prospect of New Trier going all the way in a successful season, football players were left with little spirit in the barren student section. As one of the biggest public schools in the state, a little more than a dozen students showing up for an elimination football game is embarrassing.

St. Charles bussed in fans to root for their team and one might have been confused about who had home field advantage as the away team student section was roaring in comparison to the Trevians.

Part of the reason the low attendance occurred was because the game was scheduled the same day as the Cubs parade. With only a 51% attendance rate at school that same day, according to Assistant Principal Gerry Munley, it might not be expected for students to attend the game that night. Still, this was a Friday night football game during a season where expectations were high.

Many students claim that the main reason for not going was that the school was breathalyzing students. Usually at a home football game, students are admitted with an ID and can walk to the bleachers. However, according to student accounts at this game, all students had to be breathalyzed for admittance.

What is interesting is that school officials chose to breathalyze students the day of the Cubs parade, where many upperclassmen perhaps participated in illicit activities at the parade.

However, our show of spirit cannot be blamed on the school administration; they were doing their job and ensuring the safety of their students at the school evemt.

We should have anticipated this and done things differently. Don’t we have a responsibility to the team that provided the biggest win in Central Suburban League history and created fan excitement to get to the second round of the playoffs this year? We should have showed up.

We owed it to a team that has worked day in and day out and the coaching staff who was hungry for a state championship trophy. We supported the team throughout the regular season, but we could not show up in the most important and anticipated game of the year.

Yes the Cubs parade was important; we could argue it was a once in a life time opportunity with the Cubs losing track record. Going to the parade was in our right as citizens of Chicago.

But we can do better.

The football team, along with other athletes, stayed at school in order to be eligible to play later that night. They sat through desolate classes without the normal clamor of a packed school. There were no cheers or high fives from friends. But even while walking through the empty hallways there was hope of a succesful elimination game under the Friday night lights.

We disappointed them.  We should take this failure as an opportunity to do better. Competitive basketball, swimming, soccer and lacrosse seasons are quickly approaching. We should appear for those games and live up to the name of the Green Team. A strong fan section will remind our opponents that New Trier is still a high school to be reckoned with.

And to the New Trier Football team: the fact that St. Charles had a larger fan turnout than the home team is embarrassing. We’re sorry.