Last week, our knee-high wrestling team made it to the team championship tournament. It’s been a tough season for our kids, but they managed to wrestle well, overcoming some holes in the lineup and some injuries, to make it to the championships.

I’ve written about becoming a “wrestling mom” before, and it’s a sport that I’ve come to respect for the lessons it teaches beyond the mat. This year has been particularly rough for G, as it’s the first year that he doesn’t have A’s leadership to follow. A may not have been the best wrestler on the mat, but he has leadership skills, dogged persistence and a competitive nature that came through for him even when his wrestling skills didn’t. G is a different animal altogether, and his main goal in life is to be friends with everyone. He has a very hard time seeing his opponent as the “enemy,” and his dismal record this year proved it.

As a parent, I adopted the “we’re just lucky to be here” attitude toward the match and vowed to enjoy the experience of championships regardless of how the score turned out. We had the added benefit of hosting the tournament this year, so my parental nerves were calmed by preparing slow cookers full of food and manning the concession stand for a few hours.

Finally, it was time for our match. The Wonderful Husband, who is one of the coaches, had been playing out various scenarios for days, replaying every match from our previous head-to-head, and preparing our wrestlers to not make the same mistakes they made previously, or to capitalize on their previous successes. No matter which way he sliced it, he had a feeling that the win or the loss would come down to G’s match at the end.

I took my seat in the bleachers, next to my best wrestling mom friend, and we started to cheer for our boys. Another good friend of ours who is a former official and very knowledgeable about the sport of wrestling came to the match to support our team, and listening to him explain ref calls and predict what moves a wrestler might employ added to the enjoyment of the event.

And then, the “fans” behind us started in. At first, it was just a few comments about a bad call they felt the ref had made. Then, as the score began to swing in our favor, and as our team rallied together to pull out some tough matches, the comments got nastier. These parents accused our kids of cheating. They accused the ref of being biased. They started getting louder and more vulgar and more accusatory. Finally, they even started cursing at our team and at the referee. My friend turned around and asked them to please watch their language, and of course, they responded very rudely to her.

In another match or so, one of their own children wrestled, lost and ran off the mat in a fit and came right up into the bleachers, blaming everyone else for his loss. Now, at least for our team, the protocol after a match, win or lose, is to shake hands with your opponent, shake hands with the other coaches, and then return for a talk with your coach and sit on the mat with the rest of the team. Blowing all of that off to run to the bleachers to complain to your parents is just bad form.

The parents then continued to support every excuse their wrestler made. They agreed that the ref had been lousy and that our wrestlers were cheaters. They never reprimanded their child for his bad sportsmanship or the fact that he walked away from his team when they needed him most.

As I watched the rest of the match, I took off my mom hat and put on my coach hat. I saw one team getting more revved up by their success. I saw our kids stay on the mat and come together to cheer for each other. As G took to the mat, every single wrestler and coach was on their feet, cheering him on. The other team’s attitude mimicked the parents who sat behind me. Some of their wrestlers were in the stands complaining to their parents. Others were taking their losses personally and pouting. As I watched G pull himself together and manage to get his first pin all season, helping to clinch the team’s victory, I knew that his success would not have been possible without the support of his team and their great attitude.

I watched as these parents angrily packed up their stuff, huffing and puffing the entire time about what terrible cheaters our kids were and how terrible the officiating was. I watched them storm out of the doors that had the big signs pasted on them “Respect our Officials.” I then heard them complain loudly as they walked through the parking lot about how “ripped off” they had been.

The truly sad thing is that for me, whenever I hear about this team again, or whenever our team plays theirs again in any sport, I will remember these fans’ attitudes. I will also remember how it directly affected their players’ performances. I am sad that those wrestlers missed out on the “just happy to be here” vibe that our kids had. I am sad that those parents couldn’t get behind the positive things that did happen and rally their kids like our team did. Our team lost their next two matches, but they did it with their heads held high and they gave 110 percent. Their attitudes never wavered, and at the end of the day, they cheered as loudly for G’s final loss as they did for his earlier win. At the end of the day, one group of kids learned that by rallying together and supporting each other, they could be better than they were before, and one group learned that their failure was everyone else’s fault. I know which lesson I want my kid to learn, and which lesson is going to matter 20 years from now when no one even remembers who won or lost this match.

Liz Pinkey is a contributing writer to the Times News. Her column appears weekly in our Saturday feature section.