Jack Riley ’24
The Sports section of the Scholium is introducing a new column: Chalk Talk. Each month a new set of students will engage in a debate about local, national, and international sports, encouraging Scholium readers of the Sports section to express their own personal opinions. This month, Brendan Schlitt ‘24, Gautam Ketkar ‘24, Rohan Sivakumar ‘24, and Connor Shanahan ‘24 sat down together for the first debate.
Who will win the NFC East?
All: Eagles
Schlitt: “teams like the Commanders with Carson Wentz who’s off to a great start this season could offer a threat.”
Photo courtesy of espn.com
Which NBA and WNBA players are the best in their respective leagues?
Ketkar: Sue Bird of the Seattle Storm, because her “legacy is very influential to many who aspire to play basketball.”
Schlitt and Sivakumar: Diana Taurasi of the Phoenix Mercury is clearly the best because she is the WNBA all-time leading scorer with 9,174 points.
All: Lebron James
Should EA make volleyball a sport?
Sivakumar: “volleyball is a sport that is undervalued and it’s really entertaining to watch.” When EA hosted a volleyball tournament, there was a “high turnout and people loved it. It was great fun. Volleyball is a great sport and it needs more representation.”
Schlitt: While volleyball is a great sport, it is not practical to include it as a sport at EA because many other sports teams rely on the field house to hold practices, and adding volleyball to the mix would make everything more complicated.
Should EA hold winter and spring equivalents of EA/AIS/HAV day?
Schlitt: EA should hold the event every season because “not all people play a fall sport and they don’t have that experience of a whole school behind their team… I think it would help conserve and create a rivalry ongoing each season.”
Shanahan: “Yes, and whichever school wins at least two of the three seasons should get the sweater/banner for the year.”
Anonymous: If the triumvirate of schools were to hold events in the winter and spring, the importance of the traditional fall competition would lose significance. Also, we would probably lose because Haverford is better than us in a couple of those sports.
DEBATE DEBATE DEBATE: Yahoo sports analysts imitate the discussions occuring in class lounges.
Photo Courtesy of sports.yahoo.com
Should College Athletes be paid for NIL (name, image, and likeness)?
Schlitt: This new system is beneficial because “it transitions [student-athletes] to sponsorships and agents that they will have to interact with in the future.”
Shanahan: The NIL system gives college athletes “experience to agents before they get to the professional leagues which adds to their financial literacy.” He argues that the new system is also fairer because in the unfortunate case that a top prospect gets injured before playing professionally, they can still access significant money for their hard work.