The Collegio Pittsburg's student voice since 1916
Many fans were not happy with the way the football season ended. That being said, I think it is worth mentioning that football is not the only sport at Pitt State. While it may be the most popular, many other sports do great things and have successful seasons.
Each sport is also gaining new players and new competitors every year. Some who may have no experience or little experience in the sport, so they need to be trained and taught. Each athlete has talent, but it doesn’t develop overnight. It takes hard work, dedication, and time. Every sport is going to have bad seasons, seasons where they don’t make it to the post season tournament or to the championship game. But that doesn’t take away from the fact that all of teams and all of the coaches work really hard to go out and win games or win competitions. The best examples of this are men’s and women’s track and field, women’s cross country, women’s basketball, and softball.
Men’s track and field won the 2015 MIAA Indoor Championship, took third in 2016, won the title again in 2017, and then again in 2018. They won their first ever national championship in 2018 when they won the NCAA Division II Men’s Indoor Track & Field National Championship. Women’s track and field also bring home a lot of wins. They won the NCAA DII Indoor Championships in 2016 which was their first NCAA Division II National Championship win. They won the MIAA Indoor and Outdoor Championships in 2017, the Indoor Championship again in 2018, and then both the Indoor and Outdoor titles in the 2018-2019 season.
The women’s cross-country team were the runner up at 2016 MIAA Championships and then precede to win the championships in 2017, 2018, and this season. They made it the NCAA Division II National Championships in 2017 which was the first time since 2012.
Women’s basketball has been on fire for a long time. They lose an average of seven games per season since the 2015-2016 season and they have made the postseason tournament every year since 2015.
Softball has done extremely well over the last several seasons. They routinely win more games than they lose and that’s shown in their record. In 2015 they went 36-19 and in 2017 they went 42-19. They’ve had a rough couple seasons but are getting back on track. They’ve made it to the tournament several times and, while they may not win, they were good enough to get a shot at the tournament which should be a good indicator that they are a good team.
These are student athletes, emphasis on the student. Many of them also do more than one sport and/or are involved in clubs and organizations on campus. Sports are not the only responsibility of a student athlete and saying that any sport wasn’t as good as usual or as they were in previous years is an insult to all students’ athletes, coaches, and other people who put in hours of hard work and dedication.