Fantasy sports aren’t just a pastime for extreme sports fans anymore. They have become one of the biggest side conversations at Dougherty Valley. From drafting fantasy football teams to tracking March Madness brackets, more and more students are logging into apps, competing against their friends and following professional sports in new ways.
Unlike traditional sports at DV, there’s no field, gym, or scoreboard for these games. Instead, students build their own fantasy teams online by drafting professional athletes. Each athlete earns them points depending on their real life performances. Week after week, fantasy players at DV compete against each other in their leagues until a victor emerges.
According to a recent informal poll of DV students, it seems that fantasy sports have been rising in popularity in the past few years. The rise in fantasy sports at DV isn’t surprising when looking at the bigger picture. According to the Fantasy Sports & Gaming Association, more than 60 million people now play fantasy sports across the United States and Canada, with football dominating the charts. At Dougherty, the trend is no different. About 65% of all students that play any kind of fantasy sports at DV play fantasy football. Other than that, many students also play basketball with about 25% of all fantasy players playing this.
Not every student plays fantasy sports, but most are at least aware of them. Two thirds of all students at Dougherty reported that at least a couple of their friends from Dougherty play the game. This suggests that fantasy leagues are part of the culture at Dougherty, even if not everyone has downloaded the apps or joined a league themselves.
So why is fantasy sports so appealing? Students explain that it combines strategy with excitement or real sports. Many students feel like the fantasy sports aspect of it makes watching the games even more engaging and fun in real time when a game is in progress since there are higher stakes.
“Playing fantasy football started getting me more interested in the actual game when I watch it,” sophomore fantasy football player Aarush Hegde explained. “This is probably because the stakes are higher for me as a viewer during the actual games.”
Some students just like the feeling of feeling like a real professional sports teams manager, since they get the ability to role play as them through fantasy sports. Akhil Srinivasan, a junior at DV answered that he plays fantasy sports because he “really likes sports,” and so that he “can use (his) knowledge on this.”
Whether it’s fantasy football, basketball, or even cricket, one thing is clear: fantasy sports are more than just a trivial talking point at Dougherty. They are becoming a central way in which students interact with sports culture, blending competition, strategy and entertainment all into one game. And, as the NFL season kicks off, fantasy leagues at DV are only expected to grow larger.
