You may have already noticed this season that the men’s basketball team is playing before the women.

On July 30, 2010, the Great Lakes Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (GLIAC) announced that men’s and women’s basketball games would start at different times, the men tipping off at 5:30 p.m. while the women would follow at 7:30 p.m.

According to the GLIAC website, the conference was hoping that the change would increase attendance for both sports.

Sophomore forward Daiva Gerbec leads the GLIAC in rebounding, but has noticed the change hasn’t done what it was set out to do.

“The later time hasn’t even increased people coming to the women’s games it seems,” Gerbec said.

She’s right. Last season, the 2009-2010 Eagle women played at 5:30 p.m. and averaged 321 fans in 15 home games.

The 2009-2010 Eagle men averaged 519 fans in 15 games played at 7:30 p.m.

So far this season, the women have averaged 292 fans in nine home games during the 7:30 p.m. time slot while the men’s average has fallen to just 377 fans during the earlier time slot.

With the numbers falling, questions are being raised. Why the change? What for? Are the women being treated fairly by playing early?

According to women’s head coach Sue Ramsey, not only have female athletes been given the opportunity to compete, they have been treated fairly, especially at Ashland.

“Ashland has always done the right thing and not just for the female athletes, but for all the athletes,” Ramsey said. “It’s one thing to do the right thing because it’s the law, but it’s more important to do the right thing because it’s the right thing to do. We want to make sure that all of our athletes feel they are important.”

Ramsey pointed out that there were never complaints from her players, her staff or any other teams in the GLIAC about being mistreated, but because of one person, this rule had to go into effect.

“If my players felt like we were second-class citizens because we played first, we would have done something about it,” Ramsey said.

The one person was a unanimous male who brought up this issue to the GLIAC and threatened to sue if something wasn’t done.

The Office of Civil Rights was also involved in the investigation.

“He decided he was going to step into our world that he has never been in before,” Ramsey said. “He didn’t grow up with Title IX and didn’t face the inequitable situations that I did, nor fought for, and some of my fights were tough ones and sacrifices were made. For someone to just step in out of the blue and make sure this is brought before the Office of Civil Rights as a Title IX violation without asking is something I don’t agree with.”

Ramsey was the first woman to receive a basketball scholarship at the University of Indiana, where she played for three years and was a team captain her senior year.

Ramsey feels this new rule has destroyed her team’s niche and fan base.

“That niche and that following has been destroyed by this change in time,” Ramsey said. “We feel respected. We have gained our own niche as far as our audience is concerned, and families love to come watch us play. We have built relationships in the community and now the families can’t come because it’s nine o’clock and the kids have to be in bed.”

“Our fan base is generally family-oriented with younger children, mothers, fathers and grandparents and the earlier slot better fits a family-oriented crowd,” senior guard Rachel Poorman said.

Families, especially the players’ families, have also been affected by this decision.

“My parents can’t come to the later games and I miss playing the earlier game,” Gerbec said. “It was better for my schedule and my parents’ schedule to have earlier games.”

Ramsey is not the only one with a passionate response to this change.

Senior forward Liz Tyler refuted the idea that the women’s team was the “JV” game on campus.

“I never really felt like we, as the women’s basketball team, were treated like JV teams, at least at Ashland we didn’t,” Tyler said. “Most of us had routines before the game and then playing second took that away from us and we had to find a new routine.”

Poorman agrees with her senior teammate.

“I do not at all believe playing before the men’s team degrades women,” Poorman said. “I never once felt like a JV team.”

With any decision, there are positives and negatives, but according to the players, disadvantages are everywhere and the advantages are few and far between.

“The only advantage is that we get to watch the boys’ game, which helps get us ready for our game,” Gerbec said.

“I honestly believe there are zero advantages in playing the later game and would definitely prefer the earlier game because when we played before the men, we generally had their fans coming for the second half of our game, which was exciting,” Poorman said.

“Not a lot of people like to stay out late for a women’s basketball game,” Tyler said. “When we played first, we had people at the end of our games and that helped because a lot of the university and community would be there cheering us on. It was a good environment to play in.”

So there was just one question left to ask; which time slot would you rather play in?

The answer was a resounding “early time slot.”

Poorman wants it more for the fans, not the players.

“I still prefer the earlier slot to better serve our loyal fans.”

Next season, the teams will return to their “normal” time slots and the teams will alternate tipoff times for the foreseeable future.

“I’ve got some fellow colleagues in other Division II conferences that have said if this rule happens in their conference, they will quit,” Ramsey said. “Not for me though, takes more than that baby, there’s no quit in me.”