Trivia / Sakurazaka46

• Fan Community Nickname: Buddies (always in plural), after a song in Sakurazaka's debut single, since the W-Keyaki concert on July 10, 2021. It's almost identical to the fandom name of GFRIEND, Buddy, which unsurprisingly caused a minor flame war.
  • Admirers of Nanako Nagasawa, which includes Hinatazaka46's Shiho Kato, are called followers of the Teachings of Naako (なーこ教).
  • Yuuka Sugai's fans are the Bariis (ばりーず), from bariki (馬力 horsepower).
  • Some online fan groups call themselves or the group Keyakeks, after 4chan's Kekistan and maybe in reference to the group's Keyaki Republic concerts.
• Hostility on the Set: Infamous tabloid Shukan Bunshun alleged that Yui Imaizumi's departure from the group was because she was bullied by five members who were Yurina Hirate's "fanatics", who believed her aspiration to become center was a threat to Hirate's dominance, although Hirate herself got along fairly well with Zuumin. The five bullies allegedly also made other members feel unsafe and form their own cliques in order to protect themselves. The management had persuaded Zuumin to stay by telling her that the five would be fired, but they didn't go through with it.
  • While she apparently had no problem with Hiragana members personally, Hirate was also opposed to the management's attempted "commercialization" of the group by swapping Kanji and Hiragana members in and out of the formations, and insisted that Kanji songs should include all Kanji members. This allegedly also influenced Neru Nagahama's decision to cancel her concurrent position in Hiragana in 2017, as well as Hiragana's move towards becoming its own group.
  • The tabloid never explicitly named the five members, but it did publish illustrations◊ depicting only their hairstyles. It also mentioned that some of them behaved unusually in Zuumin's graduation photo (by the way, Zuumin reportedly didn't get any bouquets or farewell letters, which is unusual). Of course, both of these revelations fueled much fan speculation.
• Throw It In!: The real Keyakizaka street name is usually written in hiragana (けやき坂), but allegedly the staff in charge mistakenly published it in kanji (欅坂), and they went with it. This was probably what inspired the formation of Hiragana Keyakizaka.
• What Could Have Been:
  • The group was originally to be called Toriizaka (鳥居坂, after another street in Minato Ward, Tokyo) before it was changed for undisclosed reasons. Two original members also left before its debut due to the leak of scandalous photos.
  • The 2021 drama Borderless was based on a 2018 novel and originally envisioned to star Kanji and Hiragana Keyakizaka members, but after the various changes in the group and the COVID-19 Pandemic, it was modified to also include Nogizaka46. Who would have been cast in the original concept is anyone's guess.
  • Haruka Endo participated in the HKT48 auditions at the same time as the Sakamichi Joint Auditions.