Three championships in the last decade, five WNBA finals appearances and four future Hall of Famers comprised the Detroit Shock women’s basketball team. One would think that a team with this amount of success would be able to sell out games and have people clamoring to stadiums to see them. However, for the Detroit Shock, it is exactly the opposite.

Attendance has gone down steadily in recent years for the Shock, who once drew a record 22,076 fans for the 2003 WNBA finals. This is the primary reason for the Shock’s move to Tulsa, Oklahoma, announced Oct. 19.

When I first heard of the Detroit Shock making the move to Oklahoma, I thought how dare "they" take such a successful team from Michigan. The Shock, along with the Red Wings, have recently been one of the most successful Michigan sports franchises.

The move seems to point to an even bigger problem in sports. The problem is the under-representation and under-appreciation of women’s athletics in society as a whole. It is one thing to ignore a 0-16 team. But it is quite another when one of the most accomplished teams in WNBA history has some of the worst attendance in the WNBA at about 8,000 a game. The blame falls at the feet of the fans.

The difference is staggering when you compare attendance at Shock games to that of the Pistons’ average of 21,877 per game.

This embarrassing contrast is present at the high school level too, as female sports teams often get less recognition and fan support from their high school student body.

I am not saying that those of us who do not like to see women "strap on the pads" are morally astray. My message is that those of us who do have female friends, classmates and family members who play sports, need to support them. Female athletes should not be limited or moved elsewhere because of their gender.