Hunter Harper
Contributing Writer
Most teams strive to have great sportsmanship, but there are distinct boundaries between the different sports teams in Kaufman Dining Hall at North Central College.
Most students know that in Kaufman, there is designated seating created by the sports’ teams. Now, it’s a known fact that those tables are informally reserved for each team.
The track and cross-country teams sit along the south wall of the dining hall at a row of tables that have been pushed together, reminding me of a giant Thanksgiving dinner when they are all there together.
Ironically, for being an independent sport, the team members stick together like glue. I remember when a group of us sat down at the track and cross-country table because it was so crowded in the dining hall and there was nowhere else to sit. When the cross country team walked in, they didn’t know what to do with themselves because we messed up their entire system. They had to find somewhere else to sit, which forced them out of their element.
“I definitely think that it is something that isn’t or wasn’t intentionally formed, but was learned as part of being here for so long,” said senior Jordan Dean. “I think it just had to do with a preference of sitting places and learning that from the upperclassmen when we were younger.”
From my observations while sitting in Kaufman, the football team and the baseball team sit on the opposite sides of the dining hall. Their area of tables is a small cluster of tables that seat eight members of the team at each cluster.
“We are all friends with each other, but I think that (these clusters) were formed because we choose to sit with teammates (that) we are around the most and our schedules are usually the same,” said Dean. “We can count on being able to eat with someone we know is going to be there. The seating is just a part of that.”
The basketball teams sit in the middle of the dining hall at the round tables with booth seating. Typically, both the men and women basketball teams mash together and don’t separate themselves. They consider themselves the same team because they share the same type of bond.
“We sit together mostly because we feel bonded as a team and most of us got to know each other through basketball, so we are just that much closer,” said freshman Ashante Witter. “There are no obligations we have to our team to sit with each other in Kaufman, but there is a comfort we feel with each other and we love to surround ourselves with that feeling.”
These seating arrangements will probably never go away, so there is an expectation in some form to get used to them. They define the meaning of team and future members of each North Central sport that will continue to be expected to follow in their upperclassmen’s footsteps.
