Music blasted from the quad. The team held its trophy high. Santa Rosa Junior College’s mascot Roscoe pumped up the crowd.

Wait. What crowd?

During the rally celebrating the men’s state basketball title, the quad was nearly empty except for the players’ families and the students already hanging out in front of the library.

With March Madness displaying the passion and dedication of college basketball fans, the rally fell short of expectations.

It’s not like the season lacked drama.

The team won SRJC’s first state championship in our school’s 95-year history. Head coach Craig McMillan chalked up his 300th victory with the state title game, coaching the junior college he played for and came back to. Early in the season, nobody thought this team could win a state title, but they did.

Yet no one at SRJC seemed to care.

It was a little awkward, considering the size of the moment and the size of our college, an estimated 27,000 students.

Attendance at the games grew steadily as the playoffs neared and the Bear Cubs continued to win. Players noticed the bigger crowds and said it helped them stay pumped up, especially late in games. Anyone who went to the games would tell you the team kicks ass and is fun to watch.

Why no fans showed up to the rally is a mystery.

There is no way every single SRJC basketball fan had class at noon on Wednesday.

Or maybe no one heard about it.

After the pitiful turnout, it is evident SRJC does not have a reliable medium for informing students of events on campus.

The Oak Leaf is not read as widely as it could be – if you’re reading this, pat yourself on the back – and the commuter-school mentality causes students to leave right after class instead of hanging around in the quad. Also, the SRJC website failed to mention the rally on its current events calendar.

The rally was disorganized, the players who spoke looked unprepared and it left this sports reporter turned opinion writer disappointed.

“I didn’t even know I was going to talk until a minute right before,” said shooting guard Alec Kobre.

Scant applause followed after the team captains, Kobre and Luke Cocheran, and coach McMillan thanked the athletic trainers and the school for putting on the rally.

“It’s pretty cool. I wish there was more people,” Kobre, MVP of the state tournament, said about the rally.

Coach McMillan said he received hundreds of emails and an outpouring of support. But for the student athletes, who put in the hours studying and practicing, support from their peers never materialized.

The school needs a dependable source for upcoming events on campus and needs to actually plan out sports rallies, or another state championship could go unrecognized.