{shortcode-87b5db34b9d13ee74905d99589fe6bd7699fa2d0}

This Friday, the Harvard men and women’s basketball teams tip off their seasons with a home-opening doubleheader at Lavietes Pavilion. It’s the perfect chance to change one of Harvard’s oldest habits — staying silent in the midst of fun.

Every year, students gripe about the lack of school spirit, the quiet weekends, and the absence of fun that other colleges seem to have in abundance. But there’s an easy fix right in front of us: start showing up for the Harvard women’s basketball team. They’re winning and making history — all while playing to half-empty bleachers. If we want more fun at Harvard, it starts in Lavietes Pavilion.

The success of Harvard’s women’s basketball team is far from a secret. Last season, they fought their way to the NCAA March Madness tournament for the first time since 2007 — a huge milestone for any program, let alone an Ivy League one. Yet the student body seemed to forget this success quickly as there has been little excitement carrying over to this year.

Meanwhile, the national landscape for women’s basketball is exploding. With the meteoric rise of Caitlin E. Clark, WNBA ticket prices appear to have risen, and the 2024 WNBA Finals became the most watched WNBA Finals in 25 years. This trend isn’t confined to the professional league: college women’s basketball is also seeing a huge uptick in viewership.

So why hasn’t this cultural moment spread to Harvard’s campus?

Harvard has a long and complicated history with women’s athletics. The first two women’s teams emerged at Radcliffe in 1898: the basketball team and the tennis team. Two more teams — the field hockey team and the swim team— emerged by 1923. However, women’s sports from Radcliffe College were not integrated until two years after the passage of Title IX in 1975. Gender discrimination in sports didn’t vanish after this integration. In 2016, The Crimson published a piece detailing a sexually explicit “scouting report” from 2012 written by a member of the men’s soccer team. The report physically assessed the "perceived physical attractiveness and sexual appeal” of the women’s soccer freshmen recruits. This instance of disgusting objectification happened less than 15 years ago, demonstrating the lasting imbalance between Harvard’s men’s and women’s sports.

This gap is likewise reflected in attendance numbers. In the 2024-2025 men’s basketball season, the average game saw 1,287 attendants, while the average women’s game of 2024-2025 had only 896 attendants.. That gap doesn’t reflect ability or excitement — it reflects habit. We’ve been conditioned to treat men’s sports as events and women’s teams as afterthoughts. But when we actually show up, women’s games are thrilling — games include electrifying buzzer-beaters, deep-seated rivalries, and extremely passionate players. Supporting these teams is a way to honor both their achievements and the generations of women who fought for the right to play at all.

Some might say that focusing on one sport — or one gender — isn’t fair and that we should support all Harvard teams equally. While this is true, equality starts by correcting imbalance. Paying attention to women’s basketball doesn’t mean neglecting the men’s team — it means celebrating success wherever it’s earned.

Backing our women’s teams isn’t just about fairness; it’s about creating a livelier, more unified Harvard. Students constantly lament that Harvard isn’t “fun enough” — that we study too much, socialize too little, and lack the kind of collective energy that defines college life elsewhere. But school spirit isn’t something the administration can hand us in a tote bag — it’s something we create.

What better time to start than on Nov. 7 when Harvard’s men’s and women’s basketball teams play their home openers? Go to both if you can. And if you can’t attend, there’s plenty of time. On Dec. 3rd, the Harvard women’s team plays Holy Cross and faces Stony Brook University two days later. If you’re more inclined to see an Ivy League match, Jan. 30, 2026 offers a home showdown against Yale University. If you’ve never been to a women’s game before, make this the year you change that.

Imagine a crowd of students celebrating a Harvard win together. That’s the kind of community we claim to crave.

If we want a livelier, prouder campus, it starts with us showing up — literally.

Claire V. Miller ’28, a Crimson Editorial editor, is an English concentrator in Mather House.