Look up. How many different college logos and names can you find littered on backpacks, shirts and hats? Now, how many of those names are Georgia Southern University?

Can you imagine visiting the University of Georgia and finding more Eagles than Bulldogs? It doesn’t have to be other universities in Georgia. For most it is the team they followed through their brackets in high school, or watched win the Rose Bowl.

With over 26,000 students there is a good chance many of us did not always plan to become Eagles and some probably transferred from bigger universities. We may have showed up on Saturdays in Athens dressed from head to toe in red and black. However, we are now together at GSU, it is time to earn our respect and there is plenty of respect to be earned.

Our school is home to six national championships in football and countless conference championships scattered among our volleyball, baseball and softball teams. We have dominated the football championship and have earned our respect among our competitors.

In two years, the football team will travel to Athens for a game against UGA. Who will you be rooting for? How can we expect to be taken seriously when we get off the fan buses with half of the students wearing GSU shirts but a UGA bag? This problem needs to be addressed from within our student body.

There are many traditions and all of us are undoubtedly proud to be Eagles. We all chant and Hail Southern but that cannot be enough. We need to draw a line in the sand and say we are more proud of representing GSU than UGA, especially since they are our competition.

We are moving into the Football Bowl Subdivision and if we ever hope to become a nationally renowned program we have to start on the interior. It’s time to put away the Bulldogs, Yellow Jackets and Gators apparel. Wouldn’t it be nice if our friends at the Georgia Institute of Technology and University of Florida were caught wearing some Eagle gear?