By Brittany Burke

I managed to avoid writing this piece until I knew the UConn Huskies had secured the championship, because even I got caught up in the March Madness.

But I have to ask, did anyone really expect that the men would be playing in the finals, while the women were sent home? If anything I thought it would be the complete opposite, but I and everyone who did not pick the men in their March Madness brackets were proven wrong by Calhoun and his talented team.

So as this article comes to life for the CCSU student newspaper, I am watching the post game ceremony from inside a CCSU building and despite the fact that I go to CCSU, I am elated as a resident of Connecticut that the Huskies won. This is because you can’t help but not get pulled in to the excitement of the state team potentially taking it all, and representing where you come from.

Piggybacking off of what my editor-in-chief said last week, it is fully acceptable for a non-UConn student or alumnae to root for the Huskies. The team isn’t school specific, the fan base extends throughout all of Connecticut, and even further.

While I fully understand and embrace rooting for UConn, especially Huskies basketball in the NCAA tournament final, I don’t want to forget about the Blue Devils.

I am by no means comparing the enormity of what the Huskies did to the Blue Devils. I merely want to know why students of CCSU can’t find the same pride and excitement for their own athletics program.

The fact that we aren’t UConn shouldn’t matter. The students on the CCSU campus cheering and drinking in honor of the Huskies win should be the same students to attend a Blue Devils game and cheer on the athletes who represent their school.

I understand cheering on Kemba Walker and Maya Moore, but you should also turn out and yell C-C-S-U for Ken Horton or Leaanne Crockett amongst the other athletes on one of CCSU’s 16 NEC sports.

That’s not to say there is absolutely no Blue Devil pride, but it’s not where it can be.

We shouldn’t degrade what the Blue Devils do, because “they aren’t UConn.” Every student attending any one of the four state schools, CCSU, Southern, Eastern or Western should show the same form of camaraderie for their universities as they do UConn.