DII sports are about character, just as much as winning

By Markus Ramsey – Columnist

Like many of our other students on campus, I am a huge fan of sports. While many of us have a favorite sport (including myself), I enjoy watching all sports because of the fight and competition it shows in college students and fans.

But recently, a lot of people have been getting antsy with our win totals over various sports, namely football. While I get that watching losing season after losing season and bad mistakes ruining a team you hold dear is frustrating, is performance the only thing that matters about NCAA Division II sports.

Using football as a focus, only 72 NCAA Division II and III college football players are on an active NFL roster. That is barely enough to make up one NFL team with a practice squad on the side. Let alone any of them being able to stay on an actual active roster for more than 3 years, which is a problem for all NFL players.

There are exceptions, like Chargers running back Austin Ekeler, who played for Western Colorado and our very own, Danny Woodhead, but they are the exception and not the rule. So clearly, aspirations for making it to the big leagues are a fantasy at best, and that’s just for the sports that have a mainstream professional league like the NFL or NBA.

So, what is the point of DII sports, if not for the enjoyment of students and community members? I would argue the major points are opportunities for students, like scholarships and building character, and the latter has been a problem here at CSC.

Now you can argue who is at fault, the players or the coaches, but what matters is the lack of character that has been on display in some of our student athletes. I have single-handedly witnessed several of our football players cause problems on-campus over the course of the last 3 years (ever heard of the “Fight Nights” in Kent Hall or the gun on-campus incident?).

Many other sports have been guilty of a lack of character such as freshmen bullying and hazing, cheating in classes, and lackluster honesty and respect for authority. I’m not trying to call out any particular team and say that they’re the cause of ALL the problems, because it is a issue that has permeated through every team at one point in the school’s history.

As we all know or have been told by a coach at one point or another, 60 to 80 percent of being an athlete is about mentality, and about half or more of that 60 to 80 percent has a lot to do with how you carry yourself in your everyday lives. It’s about the respect you have for yourself, the respect you have for your peers, and especially, the respect you have for your opponent. And that is the part we are missing, and if we could get it back, I think we’d see a lot more tallies in the win bracket than we do now.

All in all, it will be noticeable the day CSC holds the right people accountable. So, the next time you are about to complain about how a coach should be fired for losing or why one player should play over another, think about the true reasons DII sports exist and make a sound decision from there, because it is not as deep as you think.