WOODBURY — During the winter season, many students tend to spend their evenings flooding the stands of basketball games. But behind the scenes, there are many additional winter sports keeping athletes in shape, off the couch, and in the weight room instead.

Wrestling, swimming and diving, cheerleading, and indoor track are all sports here at Nonnewaug that don’t always tend to be the student body’s highest priority to support. In fact, some students didn’t even know some of those sports existed here.

“When I first transferred here my junior year,” said senior Layla Coppola, who transferred last year from the Gunn School to Nonnewaug, “I wasn’t aware that Nonnewaug had a wrestling team because it’s a small school.”

Many athletes who participate in these sports find this frustrating and feel like their sport isn’t valued by peers as much as other sports are. Freshman Maddox Poythress agrees that swimming and diving doesn’t get as much attention as much as other sports. 

“It’s mostly parents coming to support the swim meets,” Poythress said. “Not many students come to watch them just because they’re far away. … I think swimming is definitely overlooked sometimes.”

But is there really anyone to fault that these sports aren’t getting the attention they deserve? Nonnewaug athletic director Declan Curtin says he and the school advertise all winter sports equally, but factors like people’s interests and the locations of some sports’ competitions can affect fan support.

“There is an issue in America where we value some things over others and people have choices, and people based on those choices support certain sports over the other,” said Curtin. “But from the athletic department’s perspective, we do not promote one more than the other. It’s the perception of things vs. reality.” 

When 20 students were asked about their favorite winter sport to watch, basketball was a recurring answer, with 17 out of the 20 participants answering with it.

This led Jadyn Heron, a freshman indoor track athlete, to believe that the student body prioritizes basketball. 

“I think because our school is really big on basketball,” Heron said, “other indoor sports are just not really known.”

From a basketball player’s point of view, sophomore guard Brady Herman also can see how basketball tends to be the most common sport many students will attend. 

“I think the school pays more attention to the sport, but mainly because it’s more known,” Herman said. 

While a basketball player may feel like basketball is most important to them, other winter athletes, such as cheerleaders, would like more recognition from their fellow students.

“I think in our school [cheer] has been overlooked, but only in the past few years because our school hasn’t had a real team in a while,” said cheerleading senior captain Megan Keating. “I think that once it continues to build, people will see more of the advanced things that we can do.”

Even Nonnewaug teams with long records of success feel like they don’t get enough attention. Although the wrestling team has accomplished a lot over the past 31 years, including several state championships and the last few Berkshire League titles, wrestlers say they don’t get much recognition from fellow students. 

Senior captain Collin Wilmot wishes the team could get a better reputation for the hard work they put in every day.

“Our team has done pretty well the past couple years, so I wish we could get a little more recognition as a whole,” said Wilmot. 

On the positive side, Arleigh Duff, the indoor track coach, and Dave Green, the wrestling coach, notice that their teams have a surge in participation this year.

“Last year, for the girls we had around seven [athletes], and this year we have around 18 or 19, and for boys around 25,” Duff says. 

Green adds on to this by saying that the numbers that they have are mostly from underclassmen, which may signal a growing trend for the future.

“This year we have a total of 22 athletes on the wrestling team, mainly freshmen and sophomores, while we only have five seniors and three juniors,” Green said.

Even though indoor track has a lot more athletes, there are still not many fans. 

“People aren’t going to travel to Westport and New Haven, and that’s why they don’t come,” Duff said. “We are going to get a lot of fans at football games, basketball games, even soccer games.”

These sports that don’t always get recognized play huge roles in athletes’ lives.

Heron just started indoor track this year, with the initial mindset for keeping in shape for her other athletics, but then realized that trying new sports could create connections along the way. 

“Although it’s challenging, it is really good for me to keep in shape and helps me a lot with other sports,” said Heron. “I’m looking forward to seeing the changes in me both mentally and physically. The seniors are really close with all of us. Our team has a very strong relationship. You could see during warm-ups that we are laughing and having fun so the connection is really impactful.”

Other athletes also find their sport worth giving a try as they provide lots of benefits physically and also help build relationships with upperclassmen. 

“I think there’s a lot of benefits to cheering,” Salisbury said. “I think the strength needed is overlooked — you’re lifting people over you! It’s a good support system, it’s a good workout, and it’s a lot of fun.”

Sophomore swimmer Scott Viveros agrees, noting the athleticism swim provides as well.

“I would recommend swim as an offseason sport if you’re interested because you get in really great shape and it’s good cardio,” said Viveros.  

Aubrey Waldron, a freshman on the swim team, also agrees this lesser-recognized winter sport is just as beneficial as the other ones.

“Everyone on the team is very welcoming and I’m friends with a lot of the upperclassmen and everyone’s really nice,” Waldron said. “It’s a really fun sport to learn and it’s not super competitive.”