East Rivalry Brings Out Too Many Freaks

The emotions are always high when Highland takes on East and often brings out the worst in people. Take this year, for example. An adult fan in the Highland crowd was banned from attending any Highland events after slapping a East student.
My guess is that the emotion surrounding the event got the better of this fan, which is no excuse but speaks to the nature of rivalry. The Highland versus East rivalry has always been heated. For decades now, the tensions between us have only been growing, with the display of feuding flaunting most famously at the biggest basketball game of the season – Freak East.
According to Great American Rivalry, the dispute is the second longest in Utah, beginning a whopping 69 years ago. With the two schools being a mere 2.6 miles away, most students inevitably know people in opposite stands. Some athletes have even grown up together, maybe playing on the same recreation team as kids.
Scores are kept every year, with Highland leading the overall series for football, 35-29. But this is no ordinary competition. With most quarrels ending after the final buzzer sounds, our rivalry spills over into parking lots, fast food restaurants, parks, and even up the side of H rock mountain.
Two years ago, a rather memorable event took place at the infamous H Rock. After the rival football game in 2023, some Highland students headed up to the rock to defend it from East students who were coming to paint an ‘E’.
Our students took food and paint, expecting a simple food fight. You can imagine the shock when East students showed up with BB guns, paintball guns, and fireworks.
What started as an innocent tradition, teasing and jeering at the games, turned serious when Highland students ended up with pellets lodged in their backs. The then-SBO president, John Pearce, was attempting to put out a bush fire that started when an East student’s firework went awry. He ended up getting shot with a paintball gun.
At our football game on Sept. 12 against East this year, students piled outside the gates after the final whistle blew, expecting the usual brawl that occurs between the rivals. It was quickly broken up, but students left determined to fight somewhere off campus.
This rivalry has reached unhealthy levels. Imagine being one of the athletes preparing to go into Freak East, getting ready for the night of taunting, and, perhaps, physical harassment ahead. University of Connecticut Professor Karen C.P. Ph.D. conducted a study on the psychological effects of ‘trash talk’ on athletes. She says: “We always think of sports as being very physical games, but they are absolutely mental games.” She found that verbal manipulation shakes the confidence of players, especially right before a high-pressure game. a
The ‘H Rock gone violent’ event of 2023, and potential of brawls after seemingly every game, proves how far the schools have taken the contest. I believe when students are getting physically injured, we’ve crossed the line from bad sportsmanship to dangerous territory.
With the state of the world getting increasingly violent, where do we draw our line? What might not have been acceptable in 1956 is now normalized. Why is it that teens can go to football games and fear getting attacked? How much athlete harassment can 16-year-olds take before this becomes abuse?
The answer to all these questions is not black and white. All we can do as a school is remember that all the players on the field are real people who have lives and feelings, no different than us. So much of sports is now centered around us versus them, when we could be appreciating good plays on both sides, cheering for simple athleticism instead of tearing down teen’s’ mistakes.
True school spirit is not just a reflection of the scoreboard, but our character as well. The best fans aren’t the meanest, but the most respectful, so this upcoming Freak East, choose class over cruelty.