By just reading the headline you may think this story is about high school basketball players and how the teams that are good and not good change every year and it’s never very consistent, but actually it’s not. This story is on why the girls’ varsity basketball team at every high school should play before the guys’ varsity basketball team every year. For about the last ten years it has been a MHSAA (Michigan High School Athletic Association) rule that the girls and guys alternate every year who plays first and who plays second for Friday nights. MHSAA had made this rule for “fairness” so that the girls wouldn’t think that it’s unfair that the guys always play the second game even though it has always been that way until about ten years ago. But in reality the girls want to always play first, and don’t think it is unfair at all. “No girls think that is unfair and actually want it to be where the girls always play before the guys to save us from embarrassment,” states Maddie Gkekas Grandville girls basketball player. 

There are several reasons this MHSAA rule should be changed. One reason is that it saves girls from embarrassment, let’s be honest more people would rather watch girls basketball than guys basketball and this is coming from a girl basketball player, and when the girls play after the guys game the whole gym clears out. Right when they’re game ends all of the student section leaves which is embarrassing for the girls. The point of the rule is to be fair, but it’s not fair for the girls to be embarrassed every Friday night game. Instead of avoiding hurting the girls feelings by starting this rule it actually is more. And when the girls team plays before the guys they actually get more fans to watch because they tend to come a little bit before halftime of the girls game, so they watch the whole second half. So really this rule makes less people watch the girls games. “The girls should always play before the guys because it actually makes me watch more of the girls game then I would because we have to get there during the second quarter because we play right after. And when we play before most of us, if not all of us leave right after our game,” Cooper Bryant, a member of the guys basketball team. Which is pretty wrong because the girls always stay after they’re game to watch the guys when they do play before, but that is just how it is. 

This rule has had an impact on Grandville High School because many Grandville High School students play basketball. And also many students go to the games to watch. “Girls should always play before the guys because the more people at the games the more the team wants to play better, and play their best to win in front of their peers,” the Grandville girls basketball head coach. Being a player for four years personally I’ve seen the difference between playing before and after, and it really is embarrassing when once your game starts the whole gym clears out, and the only people there are relatives of the girls playing. 

“Girls should always play before they guys if they want more people to watch their games,” claims Jaydon Vandeusen, current Grandville high school boys basketball player. Everyone knows that more people end up watching the girls games the years that they play before the guys. And no girls basketball players view it as unfair, they all want the rule to change. To see if this is true MHSAA could send out a survey to all high school girl basketball players in Michigan and see they’re responses and if more girls want to always play before the guys the rule should be changed. “I always enjoy the seasons where we play before the guys more, that’s why I wish it was just always like that because it’s way more enjoyable overall and then after we get done with our game we can watch all of the guys,” exclaims Alyssa Luke current girls basketball player. 

All Grandville high school basketball players that would like this rule change could talk to their coaches and talk to the athletic director (Mr.Parsons) and anyone else involved in the program to try to change the rule back to how it was. “I would help change the rule because I like playing after way better than before, and the whole team does,” Landon Regneurus current boys basketball player. And Grandville is not the only way that feels about this, it’s all schools because it is the same for every school. Once one school starts to fight to change the rule others will follow until it eventually gets changed for good how it should be. It really never should have been changed to this in the first place, because now it is actually unfair to the girls when before it wasn’t at all.