As frosh file onto campus and attend their first-ever Stanford sporting events as students, still wearing their Cardinal red NSO lanyards, they slowly begin to see the magic behind Stanford sports.
Many frosh weren’t up to date with the University’s sports before arriving on campus, as was true for Mikaela Resch ’30. “I’ve always been kind of aware that we have really good sports, but not really following,” she said.
However, after a week of orientation, filled with plenty of water polo, field hockey and soccer to go around, frosh have begun to see what Cardinal athletics are all about.
“It’s dawned on me, going to the soccer games and all of that, that Stanford is really good at a lot of sports,” said Lucas Bujosa ’30.
Throughout the first week, first-years got to experience many sports for the first time. Resch spent some time discovering sports she had never attended before, including field hockey and water polo.
While Bujosa “never cared for rowing in [her] life,” that changed when he met students on the rowing team during orientation. “They’re super passionate about the work that they’re going to start doing once the season starts and the camaraderie that they feel on the team, and I feel like it’d definitely be cool to actually see that in person and see it firsthand,” Bujosa said.
Some frosh, however, had already been exposed to Stanford sports before their arrival on move-in day, like Scarlett Frick ’30, whose father attended Stanford and has brought her to football, basketball and gymnastics events since she was seven years old.
“As someone who grew up around the area and really enjoyed coming to tailgates and coming to games, I definitely want to have a new perspective on it as a freshman,” Frick said.
Other students, like Gabi Jamieson ’30, got their exposure to Cardinal athletics through social media.
“Whenever I was researching Stanford, my social media feed would just be Stanford stuff, and then when I was applying to Stanford last year, all the Big Game Instagram Reels would show up,” said Jamieson. “I would see all that and be like, ‘oh my gosh, that’s such a dream. I really want this to be me next year.’ So the fact that I’ll be able to experience getting all dressed up in red with my friends and taking the Caltrain or whatever to Berkeley with the whole school is going to be really fun and surreal.”
Many frosh said they were looking forward to Big Game the most out of any other sporting event, eager to head to Berkeley and “really show our school spirit,” said Frick.
Other frosh, though very excited to attend Big Game, are still a little confused about the traditions that come alongside it.
“I’ve heard something about a bloody fountain?” Resch said.
“I don’t know what it’s called, but I know that there’s some musical that gets put on that Stanford students run,” Jamieson said.
Frick noted that after she “met a lot of people in my first week who have told me they’re athletes,” she’s excited to show support during their games.
The thing frosh are most excited for, however, is the memories they hope to make while bonding with classmates over Cardinal athletics.
“Stanford makes a very big point to be like, ‘we’re a great academic school, and you can do this, that, and the other.’” said Bujosa. “But I feel like so much of that school spirit comes through the group pictures that you see of big groups of friends when they’re at Big Game, and all the traditions surrounding that, or even the anecdotes you’ll hear about a friend or two going to the water polo game because there’s nothing better to do.”