BY: Pietro Marino ’23
For years, a theme across William & Mary Athletics was that while the University was proud of its 23 varsity sports, you wouldn’t exactly know it by attending a given game. Outside of a small but mighty contingent of local historic triangle residents, retirees, and visiting and local alums, the bleachers at Zable or the stands in Kaplan would largely be absent of students.
“Most kids would rather be studying in Swem than attending a football game.”
“Nobody goes to games. Nobody really cares about that sort of thing.”
“We aren’t a sports school. If I wanted that experience I would’ve gone to Tech or UVa.”
This was the common sentiment for years, but if you have attended a basketball game this season or a football game in the past couple years, you would know the students are there and are making their presence known.
So what changed? Quite a lot, and there was no better person to talk with about this vibe shift among current students than Bo Walter ‘25, creator of the @wmtribestudents account on Instagram.
WMSB: So I wanted to start off with asking what ultimately inspired you to create this account? Was there a moment where you decided “I need to create a student section account for W&M?”
Bo: So I grew up in Hampton, not too far from here. I’m third generation, so my granddad went here, played basketball, and my dad attended as well.
And so I had that connection to William & Mary right away, and since I was also local, as a kid we always attended sporting events. Looking back, student involvement was huge, especially for football games. For the first Gold Rush basketball game I was actually the ball boy.
Seeing the build up in the arena for that and then the CAA tournament was another big experience for me. Whether at the Richmond Coliseum or in Baltimore student involvement was huge like I said.
My freshman year here was the first season back from COVID when students were actually allowed in full capacity.
I noticed a decline following COVID, and I think just a lot of that tradition had been lost with that year of no capacity or limited capacity for sporting events. After my freshman year during the summer, I was hearing a lot of good things about the football team and the idea was just a proposal for a whiteout game which has since become an official thing.
I just wanted to get student involvement up right from the start during that 2022 season and carry that over to all sports. I wanted to see that involvement back up where it used to be like when I was a kid.
WMSB: That’s awesome, so you approached Athletics, or someone within the Athletics Department and said “Hey I want to do a whiteout for opening night” and they ran with that?
Bo: Basically, I just created the account and started to post and they actually reached out to me. For the first 2 years, it was kind of unofficial. You know, it wasn’t like officially endorsed by the Athletics department or anything, but the third year you know, they decided to propose it as an official thing. That was pretty cool to see.
WMSB: How did you get word out? I feel like there’s this old stereotype that, “William & Mary students don’t really care about sports or that students would rather study in Swem on a Saturday than go to a football game.” How’d you cut through that noise?
Bo: It started with just following people honestly and following the right people. You know, like the William & Mary Sports Blog. You follow some of the people that follow you and other accounts and then get some follow backs also. You know your account helped get the word out. There are some other accounts as well, especially coaches on the football staff that shared the page to and so a lot of it’s just, you know, following the right people who are going to support and then when they support, you begin to get that buy-in.
WMSB: Looking back on opening night for football. The amount of students that were there and the overflow section and this and that. What’s it like to reflect on student enthusiasm towards sports from your freshman year to where it is now as a senior?
Bo: A lot of credit goes to the sports teams themselves who are performing really well just across-the-board. You know, the men’s & women’s basketball team is off to like their best combined start in a long time. Football has historically always had a lot of success.
Really having that tradition carry over year-by-year. If you get a lot of support during one season, the returning students are likely to come back and support the next year and other people will see that and follow.
It really serves as a reminder that William & Mary is more of a sports school than people realize, people realize. Especially for the incoming students, that’s all they’ve ever seen is full crowds.
WMSB: A new standard for sure. So has the account been a one-man band since you started it?
Bo: For the most part. I’ve worked some with Tribal Fever, Tribe Athletics and William & Mary Sports Blog, but as for running the account itself, I’ve been the only one running it.
WMSB: Now that you’re a senior, is there a succession plan in place?
Bo: I talked to the Athletics Department at one point and actually kind of proposed passing the account onto them, but they really wanted it to be student run, which I can respect, so the plan is at some point to pass it off to another student. Preferably an undergraduate with at least a couple years left.
I started when I was a sophomore, so I’ve been able to run it for 2 or 3 years and I think that’s probably most beneficial to have a current student doing it. It would also be nice to have two or three content creators helping. I do think it would be cool to grow the page to the extent that there are multiple people running it. From experience, one person running the account can be a little overwhelming.
WMSB: I would love to talk about basketball. The last couple of games there’s been a strong student section, with the Gold Rush seeing well over 1,000 in attendance. I’ve seen the term “Kaplan Crazies” thrown around and would love to get your thoughts on what it’s been like to experience the renewed interest in basketball.
Bo: I’ve been thrilled with the student turnout and I think the Charleston game was probably the loudest I’ve ever heard the arena. And I mean, I’ve been to a sold out game there against ODU, I think in 2010, and it was a sell out or near close to it. Close to 7000 and even then I don’t remember it getting as loud as it was during the Charleston game. There’s just a collective kind of role for the crowd during the whole game.
It’s been really good to see. I agree the Gold Rush was kind of a turning point because the team got a win with one of the first really big student crowds. So I think they’ve really just motivated them to keep coming out and obviously the team still is undefeated at home too and you could make the argument that it is becoming one of the hardest places to play in the CAA. You got UNCW and some other tough places but the just the change from last of this year’s night and day
Shows what happens when you win games.
WMSB: What would you say to a William Mary student who has never been to an Athletics event and is thinking about going? I feel like some people are hesitant to go because they don’t know the rules of football or they haven’t been to a basketball game in years. What would you say to them to get them out?
Bo: I would remind them the students get a free ticket so it’s worth coming out and it’s a great social experience. You know, there’s a lot of entertainment on the field or on the court. I would definitely just encourage them to kind of take that first step and I think they would really have a good time and want to keep coming out.
WMSB: For someone who wants to get involved with the @wmtribestudents accounts, what’s the best place to reach you?
Bo: Definitely just shoot a message or DM and we’ll go from there. We’re definitely looking to pass the account off and grow it over time.
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