The Guilford Quakers are the athletic teams that represent
Guilford College
Guilford College is a private liberal arts college in Greensboro, North Carolina. Guilford has both traditional students and students who attend its Center for Continuing Education (CCE). Founded in 1837 by members of the Religious Society of ...
, located in
Greensboro, North Carolina
Greensboro (; formerly Greensborough) is a city in and the county seat of Guilford County, North Carolina, United States. It is the third-most populous city in North Carolina after Charlotte and Raleigh, the 69th-most populous city in the Un ...
, United States in
NCAA
The National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) is a nonprofit organization that regulates student athletics among about 1,100 schools in the United States, Canada, and Puerto Rico. It also organizes the athletic programs of colleges an ...
Division III
In sport, the Third Division, also called Division 3, Division Three, or Division III, is often the third-highest division of a league, and will often have promotion and relegation with divisions above and below.
Association football
*Belgian Thir ...
intercollegiate sports. The Quakers compete as members of the
Old Dominion Athletic Conference
The Old Dominion Athletic Conference (ODAC) is an NCAA Division III athletic conference. Of its 15 member schools, all but one are located in Virginia; the other full member is in North Carolina. The conference also has an associate member in Nort ...
. Altogether, Guilford sponsors 18 sports: nine each for men and women, respectively.
Varsity teams
Men's sports
* Baseball
* Basketball
* Cross Country
*
Football
Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kicking a ball to score a goal. Unqualified, the word ''football'' normally means the form of football that is the most popular where the word is used. Sports commonly c ...
* Golf
* Lacrosse
* Soccer
* Tennis
* Track & Field
Women's sports
* Basketball
* Cross Country
* Lacrosse
* Soccer
* Softball
* Swimming
* Tennis
* Track & Field
* Volleyball
Mascot
Origins of the school mascot, "Quaker Man", are predictably based on Guilford's founding by the Society of Friends, commonly referred to as Quakers.
From the late 1890s to the early 1950s a few students attached to the cheerleading squad would attend football games dressed in the traditional garb of 18th and 19th century
Quakers
Quakers are people who belong to a historically Protestant Christian set of denominations known formally as the Religious Society of Friends. Members of these movements ("theFriends") are generally united by a belief in each human's abil ...
. Whenever the team scored a touchdown, a designated “Quaker Man” would dry-fire a
musket
A musket is a muzzle-loaded long gun that appeared as a smoothbore weapon in the early 16th century, at first as a heavier variant of the arquebus, capable of penetrating plate armour. By the mid-16th century, this type of musket gradually d ...
.
Regarding a logo, since the late 1950s the athletics department had been using the
Quaker Oats Company
The Quaker Oats Company, known as Quaker, is an American food conglomerate based in Chicago. It has been owned by PepsiCo since 2001.
History Precursor miller companies
In the 1850s, Ferdinand Schumacher and Robert Stuart founded oat mills. S ...
logo, fashioned after
William Penn
William Penn ( – ) was an English writer and religious thinker belonging to the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers), and founder of the Province of Pennsylvania, a North American colony of England. He was an early advocate of democracy a ...
, often as a shoulder patch on varsity jackets. But in 1968, athletics department staffer John Lambeth called for a redesign and a "mean-looking" Quaker caricature was chosen among several hand drawn entries.
The new logo became controversial when some coaches modified “mean Quaker” to hold items such as a tennis racket or lacrosse stick, or when he was redrawn as crouched in a football lineman stance. Owing to the lack of overall brand cohesiveness the primary logo for all sports teams eventually reverted to the school's crimson and gray initial “G.”
However, use of the caricature “mean Quaker” logo continued on as a secondary brand-mark, and is still employed as a design element on various team uniforms and gear, college-branded apparel and accessories, and on official letterhead of the athletics booster organization, the Quaker Club.
Since around the year 2000, the mascot has been referred to as "Nathan the Quaker", after school founder Nathan Hunt. A costumed “Quaker" has appeared at sporting events dating back to late 1980s.
National Championships
Despite its small size, Guilford College has achieved great athletics success over the course of the school's history. Guilford teams have won five national team championships and one individual national title.
1972-73 Men's Basketball
After building a nationally competitive team in the late 1960s and early 1970s, Guilford finally cracked through to win its first national championship in 1972–73. Under the direction of third-year head coach Jack Jensen, the unseeded Quakers (29-5) completed an improbable run through the
NAIA Tournament field with a 99–96 win over eighth-seeded Maryland-Eastern Shore in Kansas City, Mo. Three student-athletes from the 1972-73 team played in the NBA:
M.L. Carr '73,
World B. Free
World B. Free (born Lloyd Bernard Free; December 9, 1953) is a retired American professional basketball player who played in the National Basketball Association (NBA) from 1975 to 1988. Free was known as the "Prince of Mid-Air", "Brownsville Bom ...
'76 and Greg Jackson '74. Seven have been inducted into the Guilford College Athletics Hall of Fame, including Free, the 1973 Chuck Taylor NAIA Tournament MVP.
1980-81 Women's Tennis
The 1980-81 women's tennis team shared the inaugural
NAIA championship with Grand Canyon (Ariz.) University for the school's second national title. Under the direction of fourth-year head coach Gayle Currie, the Quakers earned 27 team points. Currie garnered co-National Coach of the Year honors with Marlene Bjornsrud from Grand Canyon.
Tarja Koho, 1981-82 Women's Tennis National Singles Champion
While Guilford lost the
NAIA team title to Westmont College (Calif.), 28–25, freshman Tarja Koho finished the season with a perfect 31–0 record in singles competition. The Finland native earned the tournament's top seed after cruising through the regular season and District 26 Tournament without losing a set, a streak she continued through the national tournament.
1988-89 Men's Golf
After coming in second to Huntingdon College from 1985 to 1987, Guilford rebounded to beat the Hawks and take the
NAIA Championship in 1989. Mike Hutcheon '89 placed third with a three-round total of 219. Classmate Lee Porter took 12th with a 299, while juniors Jed Venhuizen and Mitch Clodfelter took 17th and 24th, with a 302 and 304, respectively. The title made coach Jack Jensen just the second coach in NAIA history to coach national championship teams in two different sports.
2001-02 Men's Golf
After taking second in the 2001 championships by one stroke, Guilford won the first
National Collegiate Athletic Association
The National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) is a nonprofit organization that regulates student athletics among about 1,100 schools in the United States, Canada, and Puerto Rico. It also organizes the athletic programs of colleges an ...
(NCAA) Division III Championship in school history. The Quakers trailed first-place Methodist College by three strokes after three rounds, but rallied to clinch first place by six strokes on the last day. Coach Jack Jensen received his second Eaton Golf Pride National Coach of the Year Award after the victory. Dave Patterson paced the Quakers with a 295 that placed second among individuals. Andrew Biggadike '02 joined Patterson as a First Team All-American by shooting 299, good enough for sixth place. Classmate Savio Nazareth '03 placed 18th with a 306.
2004-05 Men's Golf
Guilford placed three students among the top-five finishers and won the 22-team tournament by 25 strokes, the seventh-largest margin in
National Collegiate Athletic Association
The National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) is a nonprofit organization that regulates student athletics among about 1,100 schools in the United States, Canada, and Puerto Rico. It also organizes the athletic programs of colleges an ...
(NCAA) Division III history. The Quakers' Colin Clark '07 won a playoff over teammate Dave Patterson to take medalist honors and become the Quakers' third national champion. Brant Stovall '11 placed fifth with a 294.
Famous Quakers
*
Herb Appenzeller
*
M.L. Carr
*
Rick Ferrell
Richard Benjamin Ferrell (October 12, 1905 – July 27, 1995) was an American professional baseball player, coach, scout, and executive. He played for 18 seasons in Major League Baseball (MLB) as a catcher for the St. Louis Browns, Boston Red Sox ...
*
World B. Free
World B. Free (born Lloyd Bernard Free; December 9, 1953) is a retired American professional basketball player who played in the National Basketball Association (NBA) from 1975 to 1988. Free was known as the "Prince of Mid-Air", "Brownsville Bom ...
*
Bob Kauffman
Robert Kauffman (July 13, 1946 – July 25, 2015) was an American professional basketball player and coach. Kaufmann was a three time NBA All-Star.
Early life
Robert Alan Kauffman was born July 13, 1946 in Brooklyn, N.Y., to LeRoy and Anne Ka ...
*
Dave Odom
George David Odom (born October 9, 1942) is a retired American men's college basketball coach. He served as the head coach of the East Carolina Pirates, Wake Forest Demon Deacons and South Carolina Gamecocks.
Playing career
Odom began his caree ...
*
Tony Womack
Anthony Darrell Womack (born September 25, 1969) is an American former professional baseball player. He played all or parts of 13 seasons in Major League Baseball (MLB), with most of his career spent with the Pittsburgh Pirates and the Arizona Di ...
References
External links
*
NCSHOF
{{National Intercollegiate Rugby Association