New York University Violets
Encyclopedia
NYU Violets is the name of the sports teams and other competitive teams at New York University
. The colors are the trademarked hue "NYU Violet", and white. The school mascot
represents a bobcat. The Violets compete as NCAA
Division III teams in the University Athletic Association
conference. The university sponsors varsity sports as well as several intramural
and club teams.
. Exceptions are men’s volleyball, which competes in the Division I Eastern Collegiate Volleyball Association, and the fencing team, which also participates in Division I. The National Intercollegiate Women's Fencing Association
(NIWFA) was founded by NYU freshmen Julia Jones
and Dorothy Hafner.
While a member of Division I, the Violets' basketball team achieved prominence by finishing as the runner-up to Oklahoma State (coached by the legendary Henry Iba
) in the 1945 NCAA tournament and making it to the Final Four in 1960 (won by Ohio State, whose roster featured legends Jerry Lucas
and John Havlicek
). The Violets' most recent post season accomplishments as a Division I school was finishing as the runner up in the 1966 National Invitational Tournament, in which they lost to BYU
.
Although the nickname for the university’s sports teams has always been "The Violets", the need was felt for a mascot to appear at athletic competitions. In the 1980s, the Department of Athletics began using a Bobcat as the mascot. The choice was derived from the abbreviation then being used by the Bobst Library computerized catalog — short: Bobcat.
While NYU had many All American football players (most outstanding among them Hall of Famer Ken Strong
'56), NYU has not had a varsity football
team since the 1960s. In fact, NYU gave up varsity football after 69 "lean" years in 1942 (see Time Magazine, Mar. 2 1942) However they maintained a nationally ranked basketball team through the sixties with such stars as Barry Kramer and Satch Sanders, sending them to the NBA They played most of their games in Madison Square Garden
, most notably their duels with UCLA led by Kareem Abdul-Jabbar
. Less exalted local opponents like Fordham played in the field house on the Heights campus. The sale of the University Heights campus in 1971 further hampered attempts to create a football team, due to scant recreational space downtown. Several other valiant but ill-fated attempts have been made to revive football at NYU at club level, both as an intramural activity and as an intercollegiate sport. From 1964-1966, NYU participated with Georgetown in NYU’s first attempt to play non-division I football, reviving Georgetown football but not doing the same for NYU. The same fate was met after club "competitions" with Fordham about two decades later. As recently as 2003 several students created a football club but struggled to find extra funding to defray expenses, find supporters, or reliable participants for practices and games (held at the East River Park
football fields at 6th and FDR.)
Intercollegiate sports at NYU had moments of importance beyond anything shown by a scoreboard. In the 1940 season, before a football game between NYU and Missouri
, students protested against the "gentlemen's agreement
" to exclude Black athletes (at Missouri's
request). The protest against this practice is the first time such protests were recorded to have occurred
The university's men's fencing team won the most NCAA Division I championships or co-championships prior to the NCAA's establishment of coed team competition in 1990. The twelve titles were earned between 1947 and 1976. The women's fencing team has been national champions ten times—the women's foil team won the NIWFA's Mildred Stuyvesant-Fish Trophy from 1929 to 1933, in 1938, from 1949 to 1951, and in 1971.
NYU, in its short history in NCAA Division III, has won two national team championships (and many league championships). The basketball program has enjoyed a good deal of success since its return to intercollegiate competition. In 1997, the women’s basketball team, led by head coach Janice Quinn, won a championship title over the University of Wisconsin–Eau Claire and in 2007 returned to the Final Four. NYU men's basketball and head coach Joe Nesci
appeared in the Division III National Championship game in 1994.
In 2007, the men's cross country team, led by head coach Nick McDonough, captured the NCAA Division III team championship at St. Olaf College in Northfield, MN.
NYU men's and women's swimming teams, under head coaches Bob Sorensen and Lauren Smith respectively, have done well in recent years capturing consecutive (2004-2005) Eastern College Athletic Conference
(ECAC) Division III Swimming and Diving Championships.
The women and men’s track and field teams, under coach Nick McDonough, practice at both Coles and the 168th St Armory. Christian Majdick of the men’s track and field team captured the NCAA Division III championship for the triple jump in 2003. Lauren Henkel, one of the most successful athletes in NYU track and field history, and the current assistant coach of the men's & women's track and field teams, acquired All-American status three times in the High Jump.
The men's and women's soccer teams, under their respective coaches Joe Behan and Werner T. Dasbach practice at Pier 40 on the Hudson River. (Intramural clubs also practice at the East River Park
soccer fields.) In 2003, the women's soccer team competed in the NCAA Division III Sweet Sixteen (top 16). The men’s soccer team won its league ECAC championship in the 2005-2006 season. However, the men’s soccer team’s most successful campaign came in the 2006 season, as the team set many records including total wins and longest streak without conceding a goal. Further, the team qualified for the Division III NCAA tournament for the first time in more than 30 years, reaching their first Final Four before losing to eventual champions Messiah College
. They followed that up with a second consecutive NCAA appearance in 2007.
Many NYU students also compete in several "club" (which may or may not compete on an unofficial intercollegiate basis) and intramural sports, including lacrosse
, crew
, squash
, rugby union
, badminton
, ice hockey
, baseball
, softball
, equestrian
, martial arts
, ultimate
, and triathlon
. The Coles Sports and Recreation Center
serves as the home base of several of NYU's intercollegiate athletic teams, including basketball
, wrestling
, and volleyball
. Coles is considered the center of recreational and athletic needs for the university's students, faculty, staff, and alumni. Coles has plenty facilities, such as weight rooms, squash courts, tennis courts, 25 meter swimming pool, basketball courts, and a rooftop running track. It also offers nearly 130 classes, serving about 10,000 members of the university community.
Many of NYU's varsity teams sometimes play their games at various facilities and fields throughout Manhattan because of the scarcity of space for playing fields in that borough. The soccer teams play their home games at Van Cortlandt Park
, and the track and field teams have their home meets at the New Balance Track and Field Center. The golf team does not have a home golf course in Manhattan, but they often practice at the Chelsea Piers
Athletic Facility and at various country club courses that have a relationship with the team and university in New York City.
In 2002, NYU opened the Palladium Athletic Facility as the second on-campus recreational facility. This facility's amenities include a rock-climbing wall, a natatorium
with a 25-yard by 25-meter swimming pool, basketball courts, weight training, cardiovascular rooms, and a spinning room. The Palladium, erected on the site of the famous New York nightclub bearing the same name, is home to the university's swimming
and diving
teams and water polo
teams.
In 2010, under head coach Joseph Behan, NYU Men's Soccer team took the UAA League title for the first time since entering the league 23 years ago. The season produced some of the best talent NYU has seen in years with the Big 3 of underclassmen Paolo Luciano ( 2nd-Team All-UAA, Team lead in goals and points, Lead the UAA in points-per-game), Kyle Green (All-Region), and Colm Dillane (UAA Rookie of the Year) and what would be a record-setting back line of seniors Nick Coulson (All-Region, 1st Team All-UAA) and Mike Burke, along with sophomore Ethan "Get-out-of-my-way" Evans and freshman Danny Weisbaum. Also, record-setting goalkeeper Matt Stieve (1st Team All UAA) kept what would be the only ever clean sheet in all league games for any team, ever. In the final league game, Adam Fein, aka 'Mr. Clutch, aka 'Mr. November', scored what would be the game-winner, sending the NYU violets to the NCAA tournament for the first time in 4 years. After an injury to star defender Nick Coulson and a suspension to hot-footed striker, Paolo Luciano, they would miss the first round of the tournament, where the Violets suffered an overtime loss to SUNY Brockport.
, though it also had rivalry with Rutgers University
, as shown by older fight song lyrics. Rutgers and NYU played 43 times in football, from 1890 to 1952, with Rutgers having a 23-18-2 record against the Violets. Eleven of the final fourteen NYU home games being played at either Yankee Stadium or the Polo Grounds
. Rutgers also played NYU 46 times in basketball between 1906 and 1971, though unlike the football rivalry, NYU had a decided edge on Rutgers, winning all but ten of the contests, including eighteen straight between 1928 and 1966. NYU's annual football game against Fordham University
was known as the Manhattan Subway classic.
New York University
New York University is a private, nonsectarian research university based in New York City. NYU's main campus is situated in the Greenwich Village section of Manhattan...
. The colors are the trademarked hue "NYU Violet", and white. The school mascot
Mascot
The term mascot – defined as a term for any person, animal, or object thought to bring luck – colloquially includes anything used to represent a group with a common public identity, such as a school, professional sports team, society, military unit, or brand name...
represents a bobcat. The Violets compete as NCAA
National Collegiate Athletic Association
The National Collegiate Athletic Association is a semi-voluntary association of 1,281 institutions, conferences, organizations and individuals that organizes the athletic programs of many colleges and universities in the United States...
Division III teams in the University Athletic Association
University Athletic Association
The University Athletic Association is an American athletic conference that competes in the National Collegiate Athletic Association's Division III. Member teams are located in Georgia, Illinois, Missouri, Pennsylvania, Massachusetts, Ohio, and New York...
conference. The university sponsors varsity sports as well as several intramural
Intramural sports
Intramural sports or intramurals are recreational sports organized within a set geographic area. The term derives from the Latin words intra muros meaning "within walls", and was used to indicate sports matches and contests that took place among teams from "within the walls" of an ancient city...
and club teams.
History
NYU formerly competed in Division I athletics. NYU left NCAA Division I athletics in 1981 at the urging of then president John BrademasJohn Brademas
John Brademas is an American politician and educator originally from Indiana. He served as Majority Whip of the United States House of Representatives for the Democratic Party from 1977 to 1981 at the conclusion of a twenty-year career as a member of the United States House of Representatives...
. Exceptions are men’s volleyball, which competes in the Division I Eastern Collegiate Volleyball Association, and the fencing team, which also participates in Division I. The National Intercollegiate Women's Fencing Association
National Intercollegiate Women's Fencing Association
The National Intercollegiate Women's Fencing Association is a women's collegiate fencing organization in the United States. The organization was founded as the IWFA in 1929 by two New York University students, Julia Jones and Dorothy Hafner and Betsy Ross, a student at Cornell University who based...
(NIWFA) was founded by NYU freshmen Julia Jones
Julia Jones Pugliese
Julia Jones Pugliese was an American fencer.Born Julia Jones, she married Anthony Pugliese. She started her fencing career at NYU and became the first women's US National Intercollegiate champion in 1929....
and Dorothy Hafner.
While a member of Division I, the Violets' basketball team achieved prominence by finishing as the runner-up to Oklahoma State (coached by the legendary Henry Iba
Henry Iba
Henry Payne "Hank" Iba was an American basketball and baseball coach.-Early life:Iba was born and raised in Easton, Missouri...
) in the 1945 NCAA tournament and making it to the Final Four in 1960 (won by Ohio State, whose roster featured legends Jerry Lucas
Jerry Lucas
Jerry Ray Lucas was a basketball player from the 1950s to the 1970s, and is now a memory education expert. In 1996, the NBA's 50th anniversary, he was named one of the 50 greatest players in National Basketball Association history...
and John Havlicek
John Havlicek
John J. "Hondo" Havlicek is a retired American professional basketball player who competed for 16 seasons with the Boston Celtics, winning eight NBA titles, half of them coming in his first four seasons....
). The Violets' most recent post season accomplishments as a Division I school was finishing as the runner up in the 1966 National Invitational Tournament, in which they lost to BYU
Brigham Young University
Brigham Young University is a private university located in Provo, Utah. It is owned and operated by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints , and is the United States' largest religious university and third-largest private university.Approximately 98% of the university's 34,000 students...
.
Although the nickname for the university’s sports teams has always been "The Violets", the need was felt for a mascot to appear at athletic competitions. In the 1980s, the Department of Athletics began using a Bobcat as the mascot. The choice was derived from the abbreviation then being used by the Bobst Library computerized catalog — short: Bobcat.
While NYU had many All American football players (most outstanding among them Hall of Famer Ken Strong
Ken Strong
Elmer Kenneth Strong, Jr. was a college and professional American football player. After a college career as multi-year All-American at New York University, he went on to play professional football. As a halfback with a 14-year career he played from 1929–1937, 1939, 1944-1947...
'56), NYU has not had a varsity football
American football
American football is a sport played between two teams of eleven with the objective of scoring points by advancing the ball into the opposing team's end zone. Known in the United States simply as football, it may also be referred to informally as gridiron football. The ball can be advanced by...
team since the 1960s. In fact, NYU gave up varsity football after 69 "lean" years in 1942 (see Time Magazine, Mar. 2 1942) However they maintained a nationally ranked basketball team through the sixties with such stars as Barry Kramer and Satch Sanders, sending them to the NBA They played most of their games in Madison Square Garden
Madison Square Garden
Madison Square Garden, often abbreviated as MSG and known colloquially as The Garden, is a multi-purpose indoor arena in the New York City borough of Manhattan and located at 8th Avenue, between 31st and 33rd Streets, situated on top of Pennsylvania Station.Opened on February 11, 1968, it is the...
, most notably their duels with UCLA led by Kareem Abdul-Jabbar
Kareem Abdul-Jabbar
Kareem Abdul-Jabbar is a retired American professional basketball player. He is the NBA's all-time leading scorer, with 38,387 points. During his career with the NBA's Milwaukee Bucks and Los Angeles Lakers from 1969 to 1989, Abdul-Jabbar won six NBA championships and a record six regular season...
. Less exalted local opponents like Fordham played in the field house on the Heights campus. The sale of the University Heights campus in 1971 further hampered attempts to create a football team, due to scant recreational space downtown. Several other valiant but ill-fated attempts have been made to revive football at NYU at club level, both as an intramural activity and as an intercollegiate sport. From 1964-1966, NYU participated with Georgetown in NYU’s first attempt to play non-division I football, reviving Georgetown football but not doing the same for NYU. The same fate was met after club "competitions" with Fordham about two decades later. As recently as 2003 several students created a football club but struggled to find extra funding to defray expenses, find supporters, or reliable participants for practices and games (held at the East River Park
East River Park
East River Park, part of the New York City Department of Parks and Recreation, is public park located on the Lower East Side of Manhattan. The park stretches along the East River from Montgomery Street up to 12th Street. The southern entrance boasts good views of the Manhattan Bridge and...
football fields at 6th and FDR.)
Intercollegiate sports at NYU had moments of importance beyond anything shown by a scoreboard. In the 1940 season, before a football game between NYU and Missouri
Missouri Tigers
The Missouri Tigers athletics programs include the extramural and intramural sports teams of the University of Missouri, located in Columbia, Missouri, United States...
, students protested against the "gentlemen's agreement
Gentlemen's agreement
A gentlemen's agreement is an informal agreement between two or more parties. It may be written, oral, or simply understood as part of an unspoken agreement by convention or through mutually beneficial etiquette. The essence of a gentlemen's agreement is that it relies upon the honor of the parties...
" to exclude Black athletes (at Missouri's
University of Missouri
The University of Missouri System is a state university system providing centralized administration for four universities, a health care system, an extension program, five research and technology parks, and a publishing press. More than 64,000 students are currently enrolled at its four campuses...
request). The protest against this practice is the first time such protests were recorded to have occurred
The university's men's fencing team won the most NCAA Division I championships or co-championships prior to the NCAA's establishment of coed team competition in 1990. The twelve titles were earned between 1947 and 1976. The women's fencing team has been national champions ten times—the women's foil team won the NIWFA's Mildred Stuyvesant-Fish Trophy from 1929 to 1933, in 1938, from 1949 to 1951, and in 1971.
NYU, in its short history in NCAA Division III, has won two national team championships (and many league championships). The basketball program has enjoyed a good deal of success since its return to intercollegiate competition. In 1997, the women’s basketball team, led by head coach Janice Quinn, won a championship title over the University of Wisconsin–Eau Claire and in 2007 returned to the Final Four. NYU men's basketball and head coach Joe Nesci
Joe Nesci
-References:...
appeared in the Division III National Championship game in 1994.
In 2007, the men's cross country team, led by head coach Nick McDonough, captured the NCAA Division III team championship at St. Olaf College in Northfield, MN.
NYU men's and women's swimming teams, under head coaches Bob Sorensen and Lauren Smith respectively, have done well in recent years capturing consecutive (2004-2005) Eastern College Athletic Conference
Eastern College Athletic Conference
The Eastern College Athletic Conference is a college athletic conference comprising schools that compete in 21 sports . It has 317 member institutions in NCAA Divisions I, II, and III, ranging in location from Maine to North Carolina and west to Illinois...
(ECAC) Division III Swimming and Diving Championships.
The women and men’s track and field teams, under coach Nick McDonough, practice at both Coles and the 168th St Armory. Christian Majdick of the men’s track and field team captured the NCAA Division III championship for the triple jump in 2003. Lauren Henkel, one of the most successful athletes in NYU track and field history, and the current assistant coach of the men's & women's track and field teams, acquired All-American status three times in the High Jump.
The men's and women's soccer teams, under their respective coaches Joe Behan and Werner T. Dasbach practice at Pier 40 on the Hudson River. (Intramural clubs also practice at the East River Park
East River Park
East River Park, part of the New York City Department of Parks and Recreation, is public park located on the Lower East Side of Manhattan. The park stretches along the East River from Montgomery Street up to 12th Street. The southern entrance boasts good views of the Manhattan Bridge and...
soccer fields.) In 2003, the women's soccer team competed in the NCAA Division III Sweet Sixteen (top 16). The men’s soccer team won its league ECAC championship in the 2005-2006 season. However, the men’s soccer team’s most successful campaign came in the 2006 season, as the team set many records including total wins and longest streak without conceding a goal. Further, the team qualified for the Division III NCAA tournament for the first time in more than 30 years, reaching their first Final Four before losing to eventual champions Messiah College
Messiah College
Messiah College is a private Christian college of the liberal arts and applied arts and sciences located in Grantham, Pennsylvania, near the capital city of Harrisburg...
. They followed that up with a second consecutive NCAA appearance in 2007.
Many NYU students also compete in several "club" (which may or may not compete on an unofficial intercollegiate basis) and intramural sports, including lacrosse
Lacrosse
Lacrosse is a team sport of Native American origin played using a small rubber ball and a long-handled stick called a crosse or lacrosse stick, mainly played in the United States and Canada. It is a contact sport which requires padding. The head of the lacrosse stick is strung with loose mesh...
, crew
Crew
A crew is a body or a class of people who work at a common activity, generally in a structured or hierarchical organization. A location in which a crew works is called a crewyard or a workyard...
, squash
Squash (sport)
Squash is a high-speed racquet sport played by two players in a four-walled court with a small, hollow rubber ball...
, rugby union
Rugby union
Rugby union, often simply referred to as rugby, is a full contact team sport which originated in England in the early 19th century. One of the two codes of rugby football, it is based on running with the ball in hand...
, badminton
Badminton
Badminton is a racquet sport played by either two opposing players or two opposing pairs , who take positions on opposite halves of a rectangular court that is divided by a net. Players score points by striking a shuttlecock with their racquet so that it passes over the net and lands in their...
, ice hockey
Ice hockey
Ice hockey, often referred to as hockey, is a team sport played on ice, in which skaters use wooden or composite sticks to shoot a hard rubber puck into their opponent's net. The game is played between two teams of six players each. Five members of each team skate up and down the ice trying to take...
, baseball
Baseball
Baseball is a bat-and-ball sport played between two teams of nine players each. The aim is to score runs by hitting a thrown ball with a bat and touching a series of four bases arranged at the corners of a ninety-foot diamond...
, softball
Softball
Softball is a bat-and-ball sport played between two teams of 10 to 14 players. It is a direct descendant of baseball although there are some key differences: softballs are larger than baseballs, and the pitches are thrown underhand rather than overhand...
, equestrian
Equestrianism
Equestrianism more often known as riding, horseback riding or horse riding refers to the skill of riding, driving, or vaulting with horses...
, martial arts
Martial arts
Martial arts are extensive systems of codified practices and traditions of combat, practiced for a variety of reasons, including self-defense, competition, physical health and fitness, as well as mental and spiritual development....
, ultimate
Ultimate (sport)
Ultimate is a sport played with a 175 gram flying disc. The object of the game is to score points by passing the disc to a player in the opposing end zone, similar to an end zone in American football or rugby...
, and triathlon
Triathlon
A triathlon is a multi-sport event involving the completion of three continuous and sequential endurance events. While many variations of the sport exist, triathlon, in its most popular form, involves swimming, cycling, and running in immediate succession over various distances...
. The Coles Sports and Recreation Center
Coles Sports and Recreation Center
The Coles Sports and Recreation Center is the main athletic facility at New York University, located at 181 Mercer Street in New York City. The $18 million Coles Center drew fire from Greenwich Village residents when it was opened in 1981. The building is named in honor of Jerome S. Coles, an...
serves as the home base of several of NYU's intercollegiate athletic teams, including basketball
Basketball
Basketball is a team sport in which two teams of five players try to score points by throwing or "shooting" a ball through the top of a basketball hoop while following a set of rules...
, wrestling
Wrestling
Wrestling is a form of grappling type techniques such as clinch fighting, throws and takedowns, joint locks, pins and other grappling holds. A wrestling bout is a physical competition, between two competitors or sparring partners, who attempt to gain and maintain a superior position...
, and volleyball
Volleyball
Volleyball is a team sport in which two teams of six players are separated by a net. Each team tries to score points by grounding a ball on the other team's court under organized rules.The complete rules are extensive...
. Coles is considered the center of recreational and athletic needs for the university's students, faculty, staff, and alumni. Coles has plenty facilities, such as weight rooms, squash courts, tennis courts, 25 meter swimming pool, basketball courts, and a rooftop running track. It also offers nearly 130 classes, serving about 10,000 members of the university community.
Many of NYU's varsity teams sometimes play their games at various facilities and fields throughout Manhattan because of the scarcity of space for playing fields in that borough. The soccer teams play their home games at Van Cortlandt Park
Van Cortlandt Park
Van Cortlandt Park is a park located in the Bronx in New York City. It is the fourth largest park in New York City, behind Pelham Bay Park, Flushing Meadows Park and Staten Island Greenbelt....
, and the track and field teams have their home meets at the New Balance Track and Field Center. The golf team does not have a home golf course in Manhattan, but they often practice at the Chelsea Piers
Chelsea Piers
Chelsea Piers is a series of piers on the West Side of Manhattan in New York City that was a passenger ship terminal in the early 1900s that was used by the RMS Lusitania and was the destination of the RMS Titanic....
Athletic Facility and at various country club courses that have a relationship with the team and university in New York City.
In 2002, NYU opened the Palladium Athletic Facility as the second on-campus recreational facility. This facility's amenities include a rock-climbing wall, a natatorium
Natatorium
A natatorium is a term given for a building containing a swimming pool. In Latin, a cella natatoria was a swimming pool in its own building, although it is sometimes also used to refer to any indoor pool even if not housed in a dedicated building...
with a 25-yard by 25-meter swimming pool, basketball courts, weight training, cardiovascular rooms, and a spinning room. The Palladium, erected on the site of the famous New York nightclub bearing the same name, is home to the university's swimming
Swimming (sport)
Swimming is a sport governed by the Fédération Internationale de Natation .-History: Competitive swimming in Europe began around 1800 BCE, mostly in the form of the freestyle. In 1873 Steve Bowyer introduced the trudgen to Western swimming competitions, after copying the front crawl used by Native...
and diving
Diving
Diving is the sport of jumping or falling into water from a platform or springboard, sometimes while performing acrobatics. Diving is an internationally-recognized sport that is part of the Olympic Games. In addition, unstructured and non-competitive diving is a recreational pastime.Diving is one...
teams and water polo
Water polo
Water polo is a team water sport. The playing team consists of six field players and one goalkeeper. The winner of the game is the team that scores more goals. Game play involves swimming, treading water , players passing the ball while being defended by opponents, and scoring by throwing into a...
teams.
In 2010, under head coach Joseph Behan, NYU Men's Soccer team took the UAA League title for the first time since entering the league 23 years ago. The season produced some of the best talent NYU has seen in years with the Big 3 of underclassmen Paolo Luciano ( 2nd-Team All-UAA, Team lead in goals and points, Lead the UAA in points-per-game), Kyle Green (All-Region), and Colm Dillane (UAA Rookie of the Year) and what would be a record-setting back line of seniors Nick Coulson (All-Region, 1st Team All-UAA) and Mike Burke, along with sophomore Ethan "Get-out-of-my-way" Evans and freshman Danny Weisbaum. Also, record-setting goalkeeper Matt Stieve (1st Team All UAA) kept what would be the only ever clean sheet in all league games for any team, ever. In the final league game, Adam Fein, aka 'Mr. Clutch, aka 'Mr. November', scored what would be the game-winner, sending the NYU violets to the NCAA tournament for the first time in 4 years. After an injury to star defender Nick Coulson and a suspension to hot-footed striker, Paolo Luciano, they would miss the first round of the tournament, where the Violets suffered an overtime loss to SUNY Brockport.
Rivalries
NYU’s rival, dictated by history and geography has been Columbia UniversityColumbia University
Columbia University in the City of New York is a private, Ivy League university in Manhattan, New York City. Columbia is the oldest institution of higher learning in the state of New York, the fifth oldest in the United States, and one of the country's nine Colonial Colleges founded before the...
, though it also had rivalry with Rutgers University
Rutgers University
Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey , is the largest institution for higher education in New Jersey, United States. It was originally chartered as Queen's College in 1766. It is the eighth-oldest college in the United States and one of the nine Colonial colleges founded before the American...
, as shown by older fight song lyrics. Rutgers and NYU played 43 times in football, from 1890 to 1952, with Rutgers having a 23-18-2 record against the Violets. Eleven of the final fourteen NYU home games being played at either Yankee Stadium or the Polo Grounds
Polo Grounds
The Polo Grounds was the name given to four different stadiums in Upper Manhattan, New York City, used by many professional teams in both baseball and American football from 1880 until 1963...
. Rutgers also played NYU 46 times in basketball between 1906 and 1971, though unlike the football rivalry, NYU had a decided edge on Rutgers, winning all but ten of the contests, including eighteen straight between 1928 and 1966. NYU's annual football game against Fordham University
Fordham University
Fordham University is a private, nonprofit, coeducational research university in the United States, with three campuses in and around New York City. It was founded by the Roman Catholic Diocese of New York in 1841 as St...
was known as the Manhattan Subway classic.