Does playing on Sunday hurt UVU athletics?
Jessica Allen | Assistant sports editor | @Jessdaleallen
Sports Column
Utah County is a very peculiar melting pot of cultures. The overwhelming majority belong to the Mormon religion. However, the culture within the LDS church varies broadly in this small concentration of people. Since living in Utah County (a long 4 months) I have come to find out that nearly everyone I meet has different things they don’t do on Sundays. Some people don’t watch any TV; some don’t play video games; and some won’t go have picnics in the canyon. Some people even wear their church clothes all day long (I’m more of a #sweatpantssunday kind of gal). Then, you have the weird group of people that don’t watch sports on Sunday. However bizarre or outlandish your Sunday rules may be, most of the county agrees the Sabbath is a day of rest and a day to be kept holy.
Now, that’s all well and good, way to keep those rules. However, not everyone in Utah County is Mormon and there is a grand majority of us (even those that are Mormon) that can be found sitting on the couch watching Sunday Night Football. UVU however has given all of us the opportunity to come out and cheer on our school in various games throughout the year. I personally do not support UVU having games on Sundays because it conflicts with NFL games but hey, who am I?
But, once football is over I guess I could get behind going to a game or two. After all, it’s nice to get off the couch on an occasional Sunday.
Let’s talk about it for a minute though. Really, I am all about keeping the Sabbath and not going to spend money, etc. And, I am happy for all those that choose their non-doctrinal rules about things they can and can’t do on Sunday; it’s when people start telling me what I can and can’t do on Sundays that gets to me.
UVU regularly schedules games on Sundays throughout nearly every sport. In fact the only teams you can’t go see on Sundays are the Cross Country, Track and Field, Volleyball and Basketball teams.
The tough part about having sporting events on Sunday’s in Utah County is that there may be several players who feel strongly about not participating due to their religious beliefs. This can sometimes leave the team feeling a little let down. Also, the stands are probably a little more scarcely filled as evidenced by the first two home games for the UVU women’s soccer team. They had a record attendance of 2,790 in their match on Friday night but then only 424 people showed up to watch their match on Sunday.
I fully believe that having games on Sundays is a challenge for all teams in many aspects.
However, I also don’t think it needs to change. Sunday was made for Sports. Sunday was made for me to watch my fantasy football team rack up more points than any other team in the Sport’s Writer’s League despite what Calvin has to say.