PUBLISHED: Student & Campus Section, Manila Bulletin, 10 July 2008 Issue (page G-4)
The 71st season of the UAAP kicked off last weekend with a match-up between the Montagues and Capulets of Philippine collegiate basketball: the Ateneo Blue Eagles and the De La Salle Green Archers.
While the game attracted the most hype, I thought it was a horrible slugfest characterized by missed shots and bad execution. Then again, I guess I could put a positive spin to it and use words like “epic” and “dramatic” to describe what transpired. After all, the teams were neck-to-neck until the final minute, and both sides gave outstanding efforts. In the end, however, the Blue Eagles won it with free throws and a key defensive play.
But it is not so much the result that I want to make a point about.
Rather, I want to talk about the spirit that animated everyone, from players to courtside spectators to spectators on couches. Ateneo-La Salle basketball games are always big events, whose tickets run out as soon as they start selling, and whose courtside seats are well-attended by the who’s-who in society.
Also, the games themselves seem to bring out something special in everyone. Fans of the same school cheer together when momentum is on their side, and get down on their knees to pray when it’s not. People, young and old alike, get on their feet when big plays are made. As one community, you feel either the exultation of victory, or the anguish of defeat. This is when I realize that it is here where the rivalry is at its best: when people come together to celebrate the spirit of competition.
And then, people go too far.
Any good rivalry has an element of respect. Ideally, after a spirited bout, both teams congratulate each other in the spirit of sportsmanship, and all traces of ill will are left on the court. It is, after all, nothing more than a sports rivalry.
Now I’m not saying that these institutions don’t have any respect for each other. Not everyone is a hooligan, and I’m sure that most people who come from either school have their share of friends, relatives, or business partners on the opposite side of the fence.
But I am saying that sometimes it gets a little out of hand.
We claim that the other side won because they paid the referees. We sour grape when one university ranks higher than the other. We reinforce stereotypes we have of people who come from the opposing school, so much so that it’s almost racism. There are instances in which we would prefer that our companies do not hire, or that our kids do not associate with, people coming from the other side. And it is here that I begin to ask myself: all this, for a sports rivalry?
Then again, this seems to be the way the world turns, anyway. The tendency is to discriminate on basis of irrelevant things like sex, skin color, or affiliation. And therefore, it really isn’t so strange that we do the same thing with athletic competition.
But when you think about it, it is precisely our history of making big deals out of differences that has turned our world into the way it is now. Racism still exists because we hold pre-conceived notions of other races. Religious intolerance still propagates because we like to emphasize that we’re on different paths, not that we’re on the same mountain. And the list goes on.
Which leads me to question, why did we have to complicate our lives this way?
Granted, any rivalry has its good and bad sides. And I guess it is a testament to people’s sanity that this one has remained in relatively the same place. But at the same time, some wounds still run deep. What I’m not so sure of is whether there is any real reason why this should still be the case. And it is then that I wonder at the capacity of people to make mountains out of molehills.
But that is not to take anything away from the fact that at its essence (meaning on the court), the Ateneo-La Salle rivalry is still something we can all look forward to and enjoy.
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