Giving Good Cheer

 

They were forced to watch squash. Well, maybe that’s a slight exaggeration, but – as I understand it – the military academies have some sort of attendance requirement for sports spectating. At Navy, as a result, most of the crowd doesn’t know much about squash; what they do know is whom they want to win – and it isn’t the opposing team.

They communicate this in a number of subtle ways: they cheer for Navy players in the middle of points, they point at the opponent and scream, “You! You! You!” when the opposing player hits the tin, and they are very, very loud.

It’s great. Of course, it’s awful when you are the opponent and you are losing, but then again, there is nothing quite like the moment when you silence the home team’s fans by winning.

               Because of crowd participation, playing collegiate and interscholastic squash is something that is unlike almost any other squash event. Mark Talbott recently said that one of the reasons he is looking forward to coaching the Women’s team at Yale is that – despite all of his successes in squash – he regrets not having experienced the excitement of college squash.

               Think about that for a moment: this is the greatest player in the history of US squash, a man who has won every major title in US squash multiple times, and he regrets not having played college squash. Is it really that different?

               In short, yes. Primarily an East Coast prep school and Ivy League sport for most of its US life, squash grew up as a favored game by the elite, and it quickly established a reputation as the quintessential “gentleman’s game.” Part of this was due to the game itself: because of its close contact, squash requires a certain restraint on the part of its players, and almost by necessity, there has been an emphasis on fair play and good sportsmanship. But part of it was also due to its blue-blood fan base.

               One of the reasons that the elite crowd was easily mocked in The Preppie Handbook is that they are known for never displaying any extremes of emotion. Needless to say, this applies to cheering, too. In New York, for example, there is one doubles enthusiast who is known for snapping his fingers after exciting points, instead of clapping. It may seem anachronistic now, but at one time, that was commonplace in some of New York’s private clubs.

               Today, though there is little finger-snapping by squash spectators, most of the cheering is still based around polite applause – except, ironically, in the two places where squash began: prep schools and colleges.

               Perhaps it is just the independence of youth, but in those two places, niceties that are observed elsewhere are often forgotten. Passions are so heightened that containing them is often not an option, and this makes the cheering loud, biased and exciting. Anyone who experienced some of the Yale-Harvard matches of recent years or the Harvard-Trinity matches last year will remember the atmosphere at least as much as the squash.

               This excitement isn’t exclusive to the college game, for one of my favorite memories is a match I played in my senior year in prep school, at Deerfield Academy. We were playing our archrival, Choate, in the final match of the season, and the match was tied 4-4. As my Choate opponent, John Conway, and I began the match, the crowd was tense, but polite, and our play was marked by nervousness.

Suddenly, a few points into the second game, the Deerfield wrestling and ice hockey teams showed up. Like the Navy crowd, they knew little about squash, but they were loud. They screamed out my name, they started stomping on the floor, they cheered like – well, like ice hockey and wrestling fans. Their appearance energized both John and me, for our nervousness subsided, the quality of our play increased, and though I managed to win in a squeaker, it is the crowd I remember most clearly.

So, as the college and prep school seasons get under way, try to make it to a match. If you do, I’m fairly confident you will see little finger-snapping, but you may just discover why a champion like Mark Talbott is so excited about being involved in the college game – you may, in fact, rediscover the intoxicating effect of feeling the unharnessed passions of youth.