Letters to the Editor
Tech Overlooked Historic MIT Basketball Run
This year, the MIT men’s basketball team won the NEWMAC tournament championship and advanced to the NCAA Division III Tournament for the first time in MIT history. Hundreds of MIT students, faculty, staff, and alumni traveled to Worcester and Rhode Island to support the team, including President Hockfield. But last Friday’s Tech barely mentioned the team in a tiny, one inch news blurb below the fold of the front page, and Tuesday’s Tech had a small headline referring to the sports page. The MIT basketball team was featured in the New York Times, the Denver Post, the Boston Herald, ESPN.com’s Page 2, ESPN’s SportsCenter, NECN, and other news outlets, but our own Tech couldn’t give them a front page article with a picture? The Tech fundamentally misunderstood the achievement of the MIT basketball program as being separate from student life, public relations, admissions, and other topics it regularly reports on. The publicity surrounding the team by national and local news media has incalculable benefits for the school in terms of strengthening alumni relations and attracting top-notch students. Perhaps The Tech needs to reassess how it views the achievements of its student-athletes. Then again, maybe I’m overlooking the importance of how nothing’s changed with the Sophomore Standing numbers.
Sarah O. Bashadi G