Over the last few months, a student-athlete on the San Jose State women’s volleyball team has been accused of being transgender. As a result, some teams have withdrawn from matches against the SJSU team in protest.
Neither the school nor the player, whom First and Pen won’t name, have released any information on the player’s sexuality, but to some programs caught up in cultural politics, it doesn’t matter.
But these politically fueled decisions have only hurt the protesting programs and their athletes.
On Wednesday night, no.6 Boise State, which withdrew from two previous matches against SJSU this season, did it again, only this time it was in Friday’s Mountain West women’s volleyball tournament semifinals against the no.2 Spartans.
That automatically advanced the Spartans to the MWC Championship game on Saturday, where they will face the winner of no.1 Colorado State vs no.5 San Diego State.
So now Boise State players, who led the team to a 19-10 record overall (10-8 in the conference), go home without the chance to compete for a title.
Even more significantly, they miss out on the chance to defeat the “big, bad” transgender player and earn a victory over the entire transgender community (sarcasm, of course), and as a result, all Boise St volleyball players suffer.
So let’s look at the impact this one player has made for the Spartans over their three-year tenure on the team.
In 2022, the team finished 21-9 overall but lost to no.4 Utah State in the MWC Championship. The Spartans also beat Boise twice that season.
In 2023, the Spartans finished 13-18 and didn’t even make the MWC tournament. They also lost twice to Boise St that season.
This season, two years after this player started playing without controversy, SJSU is currently 14-5 overall. The team also faced six no-contests against Boise (2), Wyoming (2), Utah St and Nevada.
Those schools had the chance to compete against and beat the Spartans and their “difference maker”, but withdrew instead.
“The decision to not continue to play in the 2024 Mountain West Volleyball Championship tournament was not an easy one,” wrote Boise St. in a statement. “Our team overcame forfeitures to earn a spot in the tournament field and fought for the win over Utah State in the first round on Wednesday. They should not have to forgo this opportunity while waiting for a more thoughtful and better system that serves all athletes.”
They earned a spot in the tournament and the chance to play for a championship but decided to forgo the opportunity over a fight that other teams readily accepted and, in some cases, won.
Earlier this season, players for Nevada stated they “refuse to participate in any match that advances injustice against female athletes,” in justifying their decision to withdraw from games against the Spartans.
Yet Nevada (12-17, 5-13 in the MWC) and Wyoming (15-12, 7-11 in the MWC) didn’t even qualify for the MWC tournament this season.
Maybe they both should have focused more on practicing than on what a single player looks like underneath their uniform.
