The Georgetown Hoyas are the collegiate athletics teams that officially represent

Georgetown University Georgetown University is a private university, private research university in the Georgetown (Washington, D.C.), Georgetown neighborhood of Washington, D.C. Founded by Bishop John Carroll (archbishop of Baltimore), John Carroll in 1789 as Georg ...

, located in

Washington, D.C. ) , image_skyline = , image_caption = Clockwise from top left: the Washington Monument and Lincoln Memorial on the National Mall, United States Capitol, Logan Circle, Jefferson Memorial, White House, Adams Morgan, ...

Georgetown's athletics department fields 23 men's and women's varsity level teams and competes at the

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 ...

(NCAA) Division I level as a member of the

Big East Conference The Big East Conference is a collegiate athletic conference that competes in NCAA Division I in ten men's sports and twelve women's sports. Headquartered in New York City, the eleven full-member schools are primarily located in Northeast and ...

, with the exception of the Division I FCS Patriot League in football. In late 2012, Georgetown and six other Catholic, non-FBS schools announced that they were departing the Big East for a new conference. The rowing and sailing teams also participate in east coast conferences. The men's basketball team is the school's most famous and most successful program, but Hoyas have achieved success in a wide range of sports. The team name is derived from the mixed

Greek Greek may refer to: Greece Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe: *Greeks, an ethnic group. *Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family. **Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor ...

and

Latin Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the ...

chant "

Hoya Saxa Hoya Saxa ( ) is the official cheer and "college yell" of Georgetown University and its athletics teams. The term is an Ancient Greek word usually transliterated from as from the word () meaning "such" or "what" as in "what manner of", and is ...

" (meaning "What Rocks"), which gained popularity at the school in the late nineteenth century. The name "Hoyas" came into use in the 1920s. Most teams have their athletic facilities on the main campus of Georgetown University. The men's

basketball Basketball is a team sport in which two teams, most commonly of five players each, opposing one another on a rectangular court, compete with the primary objective of shooting a basketball (approximately in diameter) through the defender's h ...

team plays most of their home games at the

Capital One Arena Capital One Arena is an indoor arena in Washington, D.C. Located in the Penn Quarter neighborhood, the arena sits atop the Gallery Place rapid transit station of the Washington Metro. It has been largely considered to be a commercial success ...

in downtown

and the baseball team plays at Shirley Povich Field in

Cabin John, Maryland Cabin John is a census-designated place and an unincorporated area in Montgomery County, Maryland, United States. Its original southern boundary encompassed a section of the Chesapeake and Ohio Canal (C&O) including locks 8–12, and the northern ...

. Lee Reed took over as the school's athletic director in April 2010.

Traditions

The word "Hoya"

The university admits that the precise origin of the term "Hoya" is unknown. At some point before 1893, and likely before 1891, students versed in classical languages combined the

''hoia'' or ''hoya'', meaning "what" or "such", and the

''saxa'' to form ''

!'', or "What Rocks!" This cheer may either refer to the stalwart defense of the football team, or to the baseball team, which was nicknamed the "Stonewalls", or to the actual stone wall that surrounds the campus. Father William McFadden, S.J., campus Jesuit and the team's in-house announcer at the

, has disputed the Greek and Latin origin, suggesting the classical words were retroactively applied to a nonsensical cheer. Hoyas painted chests

After World War I, the term "Hoya" was increasingly used on campus, including for the newspaper and the school mascot. In 1920, students began publishing the campus's first sports newspaper under the name ''

The Hoya ''The Hoya'', founded in 1920, is the oldest and largest student newspaper of Georgetown University in Washington, D.C., serving as the university’s newspaper of record. ''The Hoya'' is a student-run paper that prints every Friday and publish ...

'', after successfully petitioning the Dean of the college to use it instead of the proposed name, ''The Hilltopper''. "Hilltoppers" was also a name sometimes used for the sports teams. By the fall of 1928, the newspaper had taken to referring to the sports teams as the Hoyas. This was influenced by a popular half time show at football games, where the mascot, a dog nicknamed "Hoya," would entertain fans. Georgetown's unique team name has caused opponents to mock Georgetown with chants including "What's a Hoya?"

Harrison High School Harrison High School may refer to: in the United States ''(by state)'' *Harrison High School (Harrison, Arkansas), listed on the National Register of Historic Places * Harrison High School (Colorado Springs) — Colorado Springs, Colorado * Har ...

, located in

Kennesaw, Georgia Kennesaw is a suburban city northwest of Atlanta in Cobb County, Georgia, United States, located within the greater Atlanta metropolitan area. Known from its original settlement in the 1830s until 1887 as Big Shanty, it became Kennesaw under its ...

, is the only other institution in the country licensed to share this name. However,

Georgetown Preparatory School Georgetown Preparatory School (also known as Georgetown Prep) is a Jesuit college-preparatory school in North Bethesda, Maryland for boys in ninth through twelfth grade. It has a 93-acre (380,000 square meters) campus. It is the only Jesuit boar ...

, which separated from the university in 1927, uses the name "Little Hoyas" for its sports teams and shares the university's blue and gray color scheme.

Mascot

Georgetown's nickname is The Hoyas, but its mascot is "

Jack the Bulldog Jack the Bulldog is the official mascot of the Georgetown University Hoyas athletic teams. The school has employed at least eight live Bulldogs as mascots, and counts seven named Jack since 1962, when the name first came into use, including three ...

." Various breeds of dogs have been used by the sports teams as mascots since the early 1900s. Several notable

bull terrier The Bull Terrier is a breed of dog in the terrier family. There is also a miniature version of this breed which is officially known as the Miniature Bull Terrier. Appearance The Bull Terrier's most recognizable feature is its head, descri ...

s like

Sergeant Stubby Sergeant Stubby (1916 – March 16, 1926) was a dog and the unofficial mascot of the 102nd Infantry Regiment (United States) and was assigned to the 26th (Yankee) Division in World War I. He served for 18 months and participated in 17 battles o ...

and "Hoya" were used at football games in the 1920s, as was a

Great Dane The Great Dane is a large sized dog breed originating from Germany. The Great Dane descends from hunting dogs from the Middle Ages used to hunt wild boar and deer, and as guardians of German nobility. It is one of the largest breeds in the worl ...

in the 1940s. However, in 1951, the school suspended its football program because of the increasing cost of the game financially and academically, which left the school without an official live mascot. In 1964, the school permitted exhibition football games to resume, and students financed the purchase of a young

English bulldog The Bulldog is a British breed of dog of mastiff type. It may also be known as the English Bulldog or British Bulldog. It is of medium size, a muscular, hefty dog with a wrinkled face and a distinctive pushed-in nose. The original Jack retired in 1967, but the name was carried over to his successors. In 1977, the university began the tradition of dressing up a student in a blue and gray bulldog costume, replacing the live bulldog, though several dogs periodically joined the costumed mascot during the 1980s and 1990s. In 1999, Scott R. Pilarz, S.J., with the help of the Hoya Blue fan club, revived the tradition of an official live bulldog named Jack, to work along with the costumed mascot. When Pilarz left for the

University of Scranton The University of Scranton is a private Jesuit university in Scranton, Pennsylvania. It was founded in 1888 by William O'Hara, the first Bishop of Scranton, as St. Thomas College. In 1938, the college was elevated to university status and took t ...

in 2003, taking Jack with him, Georgetown secured a new bulldog puppy and found another Jesuit, Christopher Steck, S.J., to care for him. The current bulldog is named "John S. Carroll," a play on the name of Georgetown's founder, which name allows for continuation of the "Jack the Bulldog" nickname. After Jack injured his leg in 2012, two Georgetown parents donated a younger bulldog puppy, who the school refers to as "Jack Jr."

Colors

Blue and gray are the official colors of Georgetown University and its athletic teams. The colors are an important reminder of the school's past. During the

American Civil War The American Civil War (April 12, 1861 – May 26, 1865; also known by other names) was a civil war in the United States. It was fought between the Union ("the North") and the Confederacy ("the South"), the latter formed by states ...

Prussian blue Prussian blue (also known as Berlin blue, Brandenburg blue or, in painting, Parisian or Paris blue) is a dark blue pigment produced by oxidation of ferrous ferrocyanide salts. It has the chemical formula Fe CN)">Cyanide.html" ;"title="e(Cyani ...

was commonly used in Union uniforms, while

cadet grey Cadet grey (sometimes spelled ''cadet gray'' in parts of the United States) is a somewhat blue-greyish shade of the color grey. The first recorded use of ''cadet grey'' as a color name in English was in 1912. Before 1912, the word ''cadet grey'' ...

was used in Confederate uniforms. These colors were introduced by the rowing team in 1876, who deemed blue and gray "appropriate colors for the

oat The oat (''Avena sativa''), sometimes called the common oat, is a species of cereal grain grown for its seed, which is known by the same name (usually in the plural, unlike other cereals and pseudocereals). While oats are suitable for human con ...

Club and expressive of the feeling of unity between the Northern and Southern boys of the College." Girls from neighboring

Georgetown Visitation Georgetown Visitation Preparatory School is a private Roman Catholic college-preparatory school for girls located in the historic Washington, D.C. neighborhood of Georgetown. Founded in 1799 by the Order of the Visitation of Holy Mary (also kno ...

sewed the original uniforms together for the team and presented the Boat Club with a blue and gray banner reading "Ocior Euro" (Swifter than the Wind). The basketball and

lacrosse Lacrosse is a team sport played with a lacrosse stick and a lacrosse ball. It is the oldest organized sport in North America, with its origins with the indigenous people of North America as early as the 12th century. The game was extensiv ...

teams use gray as their primary color in home jerseys, with blue in away jerseys. White is also frequently used as an accent to these colors, and is actually the main color in the football and

baseball Baseball is a bat-and-ball sport played between two teams of nine players each, taking turns batting and fielding. The game occurs over the course of several plays, with each play generally beginning when a player on the fielding t ...

teams' away jerseys and the soccer team's home jerseys. Campus spirit groups often encourage students to "bleed Hoya blue," a slogan used on teeshirts and bumper stickers sold to fans. Fans are generally encouraged to wear gray to home games, and sellouts are referred to as a "gray out." Though various shades are used, the primary ones suggested by the school's identification policy are

pantone Pantone LLC (stylized as PANTONE) is a limited liability company headquartered in Carlstadt, New Jersey. The company is best known for its Pantone Matching System (PMS), a proprietary color space used in a variety of industries, notably graphi ...

409 and pantone 282, which is the same shade as

Oxford Blue A blue is an award of sporting colours earned by athletes at some universities and schools for competition at the highest level. The awarding of blues began at Oxford and Cambridge universities in England. They are now awarded at a number of other ...

Fight song

The Georgetown Fight Song, known as "

There Goes Old Georgetown "There Goes Old Georgetown"Listen is the unofficial name of the Georgetown University sports teams' fight song. It is also known as simply "Georgetown Fight Song". It is actually an amalgamation of three songs, only the oldest of which, 1913's ...

", is actually an amalgamation of three songs, only the oldest of which, 1913's "The Touchdown Song", contains the lyric "here goes old Georgetown". Students combined a version of "The Touchdown Song" with "Cheer for Victory", written in 1915, and "The Hoya Song", written in 1930, both of which are included in their entirety. The authors of these songs, and of the combined version, are unknown. Georgetown's fight song is rare among U.S. university fight songs for mentioning other colleges by name. Specifically, it mentions

Yale University Yale University is a Private university, private research university in New Haven, Connecticut. Established in 1701 as the Collegiate School, it is the List of Colonial Colleges, third-oldest institution of higher education in the United Sta ...

Harvard University Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of high ...

Princeton University Princeton University is a private research university in Princeton, New Jersey. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and one of the ...

, College of the Holy Cross, the

United States Naval Academy The United States Naval Academy (US Naval Academy, USNA, or Navy) is a federal service academy in Annapolis, Maryland. It was established on 10 October 1845 during the tenure of George Bancroft as Secretary of the Navy. The Naval Academy ...

, and

Cornell University Cornell University is a private statutory land-grant research university based in Ithaca, New York. It is a member of the Ivy League. Founded in 1865 by Ezra Cornell and Andrew Dickson White, Cornell was founded with the intention to tea ...

, who were all rivals of Georgetown in the early to mid-20th century, and mocks their fight songs. In recent years the Hoyas only play Cornell and Holy Cross regularly (in football), and many of these schools no longer use the fight songs that Georgetown's song mocks.

Sports sponsored

Georgetown University fields 23 varsity level sports teams, 11 men's teams, 12 women's teams, and one co-ed team. Intercollegiate sports include (inaugural season in parentheses): *Men's:

(1870),

(1907),

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. The word has nautical resonances: the tasks involved ...

(1876; 1958), cross country (1924), football (1887),

golf Golf is a club-and-ball sport in which players use various clubs to hit balls into a series of holes on a course in as few strokes as possible. Golf, unlike most ball games, cannot and does not use a standardized playing area, and coping ...

(1925),

(1951), soccer (1952),

swimming Swimming is the self-propulsion of a person through water, or other liquid, usually for recreation, sport, exercise, or survival. Locomotion is achieved through coordinated movement of the limbs and the body to achieve hydrodynamic thrust that r ...

and

diving Diving most often refers to: * Diving (sport), the sport of jumping into deep water * Underwater diving, human activity underwater for recreational or occupational purposes Diving or Dive may also refer to: Sports * Dive (American football), a ...

(1949),

tennis Tennis is a racket sport that is played either individually against a single opponent ( singles) or between two teams of two players each ( doubles). Each player uses a tennis racket that is strung with cord to strike a hollow rubber ball ...

(1920), and

track and field Track and field is a sport that includes athletic contests based on running, jumping, and throwing skills. The name is derived from where the sport takes place, a running track and a grass field for the throwing and some of the jumping eve ...

(1891) *Women's: basketball (1960), crew (1975), cross country (1976),

field hockey Field hockey is a team sport structured in standard hockey format, in which each team plays with ten outfield players and a goalkeeper. Teams must drive a round hockey ball by hitting it with a hockey stick towards the rival team's shooting ...

(1960), golf (2001), lacrosse (1975), soccer (1991),

softball Softball is a game similar to baseball played with a larger ball on a smaller field. Softball is played competitively at club levels, the college level, and the professional level. The game was first created in 1887 in Chicago by George Hanc ...

(2005), swimming and diving (1975), tennis (1960), track and field (1976), and

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. It has been a part of the official program of the Sum ...

(1960) *Coed:

sailing Sailing employs the wind—acting on sails, wingsails or kites—to propel a craft on the surface of the ''water'' (sailing ship, sailboat, raft, windsurfer, or kitesurfer), on ''ice'' (iceboat) or on ''land'' (land yacht) over a chosen cou ...

(1937)

Baseball

Baseball is Georgetown's oldest sport, with the first recorded game taking place in 1866, and the team formally organized and sanctioned in 1870. The Hoyas have seen little national success, with no appearances in the

NCAA Division I Baseball Championship The NCAA Division I Baseball Championship is held each year from May through June and features 64 college baseball teams in the United States, culminating in the eight-team Men's College World Series at Charles Schwab Field Omaha in Omaha, Nebr ...

since the event was established in 1947. The team was once known as the Stonewalls, and is one possible source of the

cheer famous among all Georgetown sports teams. The Hoyas play their home games at Shirley Povich Field, a 1,500-seat stadium located in

Bethesda, Maryland Bethesda () is an unincorporated, census-designated place in southern Montgomery County, Maryland. It is located just northwest of Washington, D.C. It takes its name from a local church, the Bethesda Meeting House (1820, rebuilt 1849), which in ...

and named for ''

Washington Post ''The Washington Post'' (also known as the ''Post'' and, informally, ''WaPo'') is an American daily newspaper published in Washington, D.C. It is the most widely circulated newspaper within the Washington metropolitan area and has a large na ...

'' sports columnist

Shirley Povich Shirley Lewis Povich (July 15, 1905 – June 4, 1998) was an American sports columnist and reporter for '' The Washington Post''. Biography Povich's parents were Jewish immigrants from Lithuania. Having grown up in coastal Bar Harbor, Main ...

. The stadium was built in 2000. The Hoyas also utilize three lighted batting cages and two bullpen areas located on campus above Yates Field House, and adjacent to Kehoe Field.

Basketball

The Georgetown University men's basketball team is the most well-known Hoya program. Georgetown's first intercollegiate men's basketball team was formed in 1907. Former Georgetown great

Patrick Ewing Patrick Aloysius Ewing (born August 5, 1962) is a Jamaican-American basketball coach and former professional player who is the head coach of the Georgetown University men's team. He played most of his career as the starting center for the N ...

is the head coach. The Hoyas historically have been well regarded not only for their team success, but also for their ability to generate players that after graduation succeed both on the court, such as Patrick Ewing, and off, such as

Paul Tagliabue Paul John Tagliabue (; born November 24, 1940) is an American lawyer who was the commissioner of the National Football League (NFL). He took the position in 1989 and served until September 1, 2006. He had previously served as a lawyer for the NFL ...

and

Henry Hyde Henry John Hyde (April 18, 1924 – November 29, 2007) was an American politician who served as a Republican member of the United States House of Representatives from 1975 to 2007, representing the 6th District of Illinois, an area of Chicago's ...

. The team has reached the NCAA Tournament Final Four five times including the 1984 national championship, and has won the Big East tournament seven times, and has also won or shared the Big East regular season title ten times. The women's basketball also plays in the Big East Conference, and are coached by James Howard. The team was first formed in 1970, and joined the Big East in 1983. They play their home games on campus at

McDonough Gymnasium McDonough Gymnasium, sometimes referred to as McDonough Arena when hosting a sports or entertainment event, is a multi-purpose arena on the campus of Georgetown University in Washington, D.C. Officially known as McDonough Memorial Gymnasium, it op ...

. The women's team so far has not seen the same success as the men's, and have only been invited to the NCAA tournament three times, reaching the Sweet Sixteen in 1993 and 2011, and the second round in 2010. They have been invited to the Women's National Invitation Tournament, five times, progressing furthest in 2009 by reaching the fourth round.

Football

The football team at Georgetown was first formed on November 1, 1874, with the earliest recorded games dating to 1887. By the 1940s, Georgetown had one of the better college football teams in America, and played in the 1941

Orange Bowl The Orange Bowl is an annual American college football bowl game played in the Miami metropolitan area. It has been played annually since January 1, 1935, making it, along with the Sugar Bowl and the Sun Bowl, the second-oldest bowl game ...

, where they lost 14–7 to

Mississippi State Mississippi State University for Agriculture and Applied Science, commonly known as Mississippi State University (MSU), is a public land-grant research university adjacent to Starkville, Mississippi. It is classified among "R1: Doctoral Univer ...

. As the college game became more expensive after World War II, however, Georgetown's program began to lose money rapidly. The Hoyas last successful season was 1949, when they lost in the Sun Bowl against

Texas Western The University of Texas at El Paso (UTEP) is a public research university in El Paso, Texas. It is a member of the University of Texas System. UTEP is the second-largest university in the United States to have a majority Mexican American stud ...

. However the program was losing too much money, and on March 22, 1951, the university's president canceled the football program. In 1964, Georgetown allowed its students to start a football program as an exhibition-only club sport. Varsity football resumed in 1970 at what later became known as the

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 ...

level. Today, Georgetown plays at the

Division I Football Championship Subdivision The NCAA Division I Football Championship is an annual post-season college football game, played since 2006, used to determine a national champion of the NCAA Division I Football Championship Subdivision (FCS). From 1978 to 2005, the game was kn ...

, competing in the Patriot League and perennially plays against

Ivy League The Ivy League is an American collegiate athletic conference comprising eight private research universities in the Northeastern United States. The term ''Ivy League'' is typically used beyond the sports context to refer to the eight school ...

schools. The Hoyas have also begun a cross-town rivalry with

Howard University Howard University (Howard) is a Private university, private, University charter#Federal, federally chartered historically black research university in Washington, D.C. It is Carnegie Classification of Institutions of Higher Education, classifie ...

for a championship known as the D.C. Cup. "Big Jim" Ricca, an NFL

defensive end Defensive end (DE) is a defensive position in the sport of gridiron football. This position has designated the players at each end of the defensive line, but changes in formations over the years have substantially changed how the position is ...

and offensive lineman, graduated in 1949 and was the last Hoya to play in an NFL game. In 2007, the

Washington Redskins The Washington Commanders are a professional American football team based in the Washington metropolitan area. The Commanders compete in the National Football League (NFL) as a member club of the league's National Football Conference (NFC) N ...

made Alex Buzbee a reserve player, becoming the first Georgetown player on an NFL team since Ricca retired in 1956. The 2011 Georgetown Football team finished 8–3, which was their first winning season since the 1999 campaign, giving them a second place in the conference.

Golf

The men's golf team has won four

championships: 1998, 2010, 2016, and 2018. The women's golf team has won two

championships: 2017 and 2018. They are coached by Tommy Hunter, who was named Big East Coach of the Year in 2010. They have crowned two

national champions National champions are corporations which are technically private businesses but due to governmental policy are ceded a dominant position in a national economy. In this system, these large organizations are expected not only to seek profit but als ...

: Maurice McCarthy Jr. in 1928 and John Burke in 1938.

Lacrosse

Both the men's and women's lacrosse teams have been highly competitive in recent years, both in conference and tournament play. A men's lacrosse team was first organized in 1951, and entered Division 1 play in 1970. The team played in the

Eastern College Athletic Conference The Eastern College Athletic Conference (ECAC) is a college athletic conference comprising schools that compete in 15 sports (13 men's and 13 women's). It has 220 member institutions in NCAA Divisions I, II, and III, ranging in location fr ...

until the 2010 season, when the

created a men's league. The men's team made the NCAA Tournament each season from 1996 to 2007, reaching the Final Four in 1999. The women's

team was formed in 1977, and won the first 6 consecutive Big East titles from 2001 to 2006. The Lady Hoyas reached the

NCAA Women's Lacrosse Championship The annual NCAA Division I Women's Lacrosse Championship tournament has determined the top women's lacrosse team in the NCAA Division I since 1982. The Maryland Terrapins are the most successful team with fourteen titles. The most recent champio ...

final in both 2001 and 2002. In 2005, their first season under new coach Ricky Fried, the team went 13–5 and made the NCAA Tournament for the 8th straight year. Both the men's and women's teams play their home games on Multi-Sport Field.

Rowing

Rowing Rowing is the act of propelling a human-powered watercraft using the sweeping motions of oars to displace water and generate reactional propulsion. Rowing is functionally similar to paddling, but rowing requires oars to be mechanically ...

at Georgetown has a distinguished history dating back to the founding of the Boat Club in 1876. The team was however suspended from 1909 to 1920 due to lack of interest, and involvement in

World War I World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

. Georgetown added a men's lightweight team in 1963, a women's team in 1975, and a women's lightweight team in 1996. The men have won 5 national championships at the Intercollegiate Rowing Association Regatta, the most recent being the men's varsity lightweight fours with coxswain on June 5, 2016. The first national championship win was in 1991 with the varsity heavyweight fours with coxswain. Georgetown University Boat Club Rowing Blade

Georgetown University Boat Club Rowing Blade

Under the guidance of Head Coaches Luke Agnini and Kendall Mulligan and Coach Emeritus Tony Johnson, Georgetown competes as a member of the top leagues in American rowing, the

Eastern Association of Rowing Colleges The Eastern Association of Rowing Colleges (EARC) is a college athletic conference of eighteen men's college rowing crews. It is an affiliate of the Eastern College Athletic Conference (ECAC). Members Eighteen colleges and universities are member ...

and

Eastern Association of Women's Rowing Colleges The Eastern Association of Women's Rowing Colleges (EAWRC) is a college athletic conference of eighteen women's college rowing crew teams. The conference is an affiliate of the Eastern College Athletic Conference (ECAC). Members :''See footnote''< ...

. Georgetown's four crew teams have seen success in recent years, including trips to the Henley Royal Regatta and entry into the

Eastern Sprints The Eastern Sprints is the annual rowing championship for the men's Eastern Association of Rowing Colleges (EARC). (Since 1974, the "Women's Eastern Sprints" has been held as the annual championship for the Eastern Association of Women's Rowing Co ...

for the men's heavyweight and lightweight teams and second-in-the-nation finishes for both men's and women's lightweight teams. Many Georgetown oarsmen and -women have gone on to represent the United States on national and Olympic teams. The lightweight women's team has earned bronze medals at Women's Eastern Sprints in the Lightweight Women's Varsity 8+ in 2013 and the Lightweight Women's Varsity 4+ in 2015. The LW8+ crew earning bronze in 2013 was later named Row2k Crew of the Week. The university rents space in Thompson Boat Center, though it has ongoing plans to build a new boathouse closer to campus. For land workouts, Georgetown rowers have access to the Rowing Training Center, a refurbished storeroom beneath the Leavey Center that was repurposed into an erg room in 2013 (its underground, windowless location has inspired numerous nicknames such as the "Thunder Dungeon"). Notable Georgetown crew alumni include walk-on

Mike Vespoli Michael Louis Vespoli (born December 14, 1946) is a former American rower and rowing coach. He is the founder and chief executive officer of Vespoli USA, Inc., a boat manufacturer in New Haven, Connecticut, that makes shells for rowing teams and ...

, the founder and chief executive officer of Vespoli USA, Inc.; U.S. team athletes Mike Altman,

Kelley Jones Kelley Jones (born July 23, 1962) is an American comics artist best known for his work on ''Batman'' with writer Doug Moench and on '' The Sandman'' with writer Neil Gaiman. Early life Kelley Jones was born in Sacramento, California and grew up ...

and Jack Carlson; and actor

Bradley Cooper Bradley Charles Cooper (born January 5, 1975) is an American actor and filmmaker. He is the recipient of various accolades, including a British Academy Film Award and two Grammy Awards, in addition to nominations for nine Academy Awards, si ...

Sailing

The sailing team competes in the

Middle Atlantic Intercollegiate Sailing Association Middle Atlantic Intercollegiate Sailing Association (MAISA) is one of the seven conferences affiliated with the Inter-Collegiate Sailing Association that schedule and administer regattas within their established geographic regions. MAISA organiz ...

(MAISA) of the

Inter-Collegiate Sailing Association The Inter-Collegiate Sailing Association (ICSA) is a volunteer organization that serves as the governing authority for all sailing competition at colleges and universities throughout the United States and in some parts of Canada. History The fir ...

(ICSA). Under coach Mike Callahan has been ranked number 1 nationally in the ICSA Sailing World College Rankings on multiple occasions. The team sails from the Washington Sailing Marina Andrew Campbell was named U.S. Olympic Committee (USOC) Male Sailing Athlete of the Year in 2002 and 2005, and ICSA College Sailor of the Year in 2006. He is one of the six team members awarded as College Sailors of the Year on seven occasions, as Nevin Snow has taken the prize twice, in 2015 and 2016. Campbell helped lead the team to the first of their 14

Inter-Collegiate Sailing Association National Championships The Inter-Collegiate Sailing Association (ICSA) holds National Championships in seven different categories: * Coed Dinghy * Women’s Dinghy * Team Racing * Women's Team Racing * Men’s Singlehanded * Women’s Singlehanded *Match Racing (previ ...

since 2001, and are the reigning national co-ed champions . During this time the team also won seven MAISA conference championships, known as the America Trophy. After the team's 2013 national championship, they were invited to participate in the 2014 World University Match Racing Championships in

Trentino Trentino ( lld, Trentin), officially the Autonomous Province of Trento, is an autonomous province of Italy, in the country's far north. The Trentino and South Tyrol constitute the region of Trentino-Alto Adige/Südtirol, an autonomous region ...

Italy Italy ( it, Italia ), officially the Italian Republic, ) or the Republic of Italy, is a country in Southern Europe. It is located in the middle of the Mediterranean Sea, and its territory largely coincides with the homonymous geographical ...

, on

Lago di Ledro Lago di Ledro is a lake in Trentino, northern Italy. The lake is at an elevation of , and its surface area is . Lake Ledro is reputed to be one of the cleanest lakes in Trentino, and during the summer it reaches a temperature of , attracting touri ...

, which they won 7–1, besting nineteen teams from fourteen countries. The Hoyas won the Leonard M. Fowle Trophy to the best overall collegiate team in 2006.

Soccer

The men's soccer team was organized in 1952, and won a national championship in 2019. That year was their second national title game, having been runners up in 2012, with nine total NCAA Tournament appearances. They play in the Big East Conference, and have won the conference tournament four times and the regular season seven times. They are coached by Brian Wiese, and play their home games on campus at North Kehoe Field. The women's soccer team began play in 1991, have been coached by Dave Nolan since 1999, and share the same home field. The women's team has been to the NCAA Tournament twice, in 2007 and 2010, when they advanced to the quarterfinals. Six players from the men's soccer team have played professionally for Major League Soccer: Phil Wellington (drafted in 1996), Brandon Leib (

1997 File:1997 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The movie set of ''Titanic'', the highest-grossing movie in history at the time; '' Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone'', is published; Comet Hale-Bopp passes by Earth and becomes one of ...

), Eric Kvello (

1999 File:1999 Events Collage.png, From left, clockwise: The funeral procession of King Hussein of Jordan in Amman; the 1999 İzmit earthquake kills over 17,000 people in Turkey; the Columbine High School massacre, one of the first major school shoot ...

), Dan Gargan 2004 (Selected 43rd overall in the 2005 MLS Supplemental Draft), Jeff Curtin 2005 (1st round draft Pick #14 overall), and Steve Neumann 2014 (1st round draft pick in 2014 MLS SuperDraft, 4th overall pick). Ricky Schramm, who played on the 2006 Hoyas, was drafted in the 3rd round by

D.C. United D.C. United is a professional soccer club based in Washington, D.C. that competes in the Eastern Conference of Major League Soccer, the top tier of American soccer. Domestically, the club has won four MLS Cups (league championships), four Supp ...

. Women's team star Ingrid Wells has played on the United States U-23 women's national soccer team and for Göteborg FC.

Tennis

Georgetown University has both men's and women's varsity tennis teams. In March 2019 federal prosecutors indicted Gordon Ernst, the former Georgetown head coach of the men's and women's teams from 2006 until 2017, for accepting more than $2.7 million in bribes from parents to secure their children's Georgetown admission by allegedly falsely designating at least 12 applicants, including those who did not play tennis competitively, as recruits for the Georgetown tennis team as part of the

2019 college admissions bribery scandal In 2019, a scandal arose over a criminal conspiracy to influence undergraduate admissions decisions at several top American universities. The investigation into the conspiracy was code named Operation Varsity Blues. The investigation and rela ...

. Ernst was charged with racketeering

conspiracy A conspiracy, also known as a plot, is a secret plan or agreement between persons (called conspirers or conspirators) for an unlawful or harmful purpose, such as murder or treason, especially with political motivation, while keeping their agre ...

and ordered to forfeit $2.7 million, a home in Chevy Chase, Maryland, his Chevy Chase country club membership, and a financial account. Ernst later accepted a lower paying, lower profile coaching job at the University of Rhode Island, where he was placed on administrative leave after he was charged and arrested for the Georgetown allegations. On September 15, 2021, Ernst, who once coached former U.S. First Lady Michelle Obama, agreed to plead guilty.

Track and field

Georgetown has been nationally successful in both cross country and track and field. The men and women's track and field teams practice off-campus at

Duke Ellington Track The Georgetown Hoyas are the collegiate athletics teams that officially represent Georgetown University, located in Washington, D.C. Georgetown's athletics department fields 23 men's and women's varsity level teams and competes at the National C ...

in neighboring Burleith. The men's and women's teams have both been ranked #1 by the U.S. Track & Field and Cross Country Coaches Association in recent years, both nationally and in the Mid-Atlantic Region. In 2011, the women's cross country program won Georgetown's only other team NCAA Championship by besting Big East rival Villanova. Chris Miltenberg, women's cross country coach, won the 2011 NCAA coach of the year for women's cross country. Patrick Henner is the director of men's and women's track and field . Georgetown track and field has won 21 individual NCAA National Championships, being 15 by male athletes and 6 by female athletes. The first individual NCAA National Champion was Charles Capozzoli in cross country in 1952. To date, there have also been 11 National Champions in indoor and 9 National Champions in outdoor NCAA track and field championships.

NCAA team championships

Georgetown has won 3 NCAA Division I team national championships. *Men's (2) **

Basketball Basketball is a team sport in which two teams, most commonly of five players each, opposing one another on a rectangular court, compete with the primary objective of shooting a basketball (approximately in diameter) through the defender's h ...

(1): 1984 ** Soccer (1): 2019 *Women's (1) ** Cross Country (1): 2011 *see also: ** Big East Conference NCAA team championships **

List of NCAA schools with the most NCAA Division I championships Listed below are the colleges or universities with the most NCAA Division I-sanctioned team championships, individual championships, and combined team and individual championships, as documented by information published on official NCAA websites. ...

NCAA individual championships

Georgetown has won 23 NCAA Division I individual national championships: *Golf – Men – 2 NCAA national championships – Maurice McCarthy Jr. (1928) and John Burke (1938) *Cross Country – Men – 1 NCAA national championship – Charles Capozzoli (1952) *Track and Field – Outdoor – Men – 8 NCAA national championships *Track and Field – Outdoor – Women – 1 NCAA national championship *Track and Field – Indoor – Men – 6 NCAA national championships *Track and Field – Indoor – Women – 5 NCAA national championships Georgetown has also won 1 NCAA Division 2 individual national championship: *Tennis – Women – 1 NCAA national championship – Suzanne Kuhlman (1983)

Club teams

Georgetown University fields numerous club sports teams. They range from club versions of varsity sports, such as tennis or basketball, to sports for which there is no varsity equivalent, such as men and women's Water Polo Clubs or Ultimate Frisbee. The university began supporting club teams in 2000. Though other teams exist, such as the Georgetown University Croquet Society, the Club Sports Board at Georgetown supports eleven men's club teams, ten women's, and three co-ed teams (year founded in parentheses): *Men's: boxing (2008), cycling, ice hockey, basketball, lacrosse (1995), rugby (1967), soccer, ultimate frisbee, volleyball, water polo (1993), triathlon (2005) *Women's: squash (2008), water polo, basketball, field hockey, lacrosse, rugby (2000), soccer (2001), ultimate frisbee, volleyball, boxing *Co-ed: equestrian, racquetball (2007), tennis (2004), climbing (2010)

Boxing

The men's and women's boxing teams compete as part of the United States Intercollegiate Boxing Association. The women's boxing team won the 2019 USIBA national championship.

Rugby

The Georgetown University Rugby Football Club is the intercollegiate men's

rugby union Rugby union, commonly known simply as rugby, is a close-contact team sport that originated at Rugby School in the first half of the 19th century. One of the two codes of rugby football, it is based on running with the ball in hand. In it ...

team that represents Georgetown in the

USA Rugby USA Rugby (officially the United States of America Rugby Football Union, Ltd.) is the national governing body for the sport of rugby union in the United States. Its role is to achieve and maintain “high levels of quality in all aspects of ru ...

Division II competition. It was founded in the spring semester of 1967 by former members of the Washington D.C. Rugby Football Club including graduate student Michael Murphy. In 2005, Georgetown's first reached the Final Four of the USA Rugby Collegiate Division II National Tournament. The "Hoya Ruggers" again reached for the semifinals in 2009 in

Palo Alto, California Palo Alto (; Spanish for "tall stick") is a charter city in the northwestern corner of Santa Clara County, California, United States, in the San Francisco Bay Area, named after a coastal redwood tree known as El Palo Alto. The city was es ...

, and have had an undefeated 2009–10 season. A women's rugby team was founded in 2000, and plays in Division II in the Potomac Rugby Union (PRU). They have won the PRU championship four consecutive times from 2006 to 2009. They have also been invited to the Mid-Atlantic Rugby Football Union tournament three times, and were runners-up in 2006–07.

Ice hockey

Georgetown's ice hockey team plays in the ACHA Division II in the

Atlantic Coast Collegiate Hockey League The Atlantic Coast Collegiate Hockey League (ACCHL) is a non-NCAA collegiate ice hockey league in the mid-atlantic and southeast regions of the United States. The Mission of the ACC Hockey League is to provide student-athletes an option to compete ...

(ACCHL) as one of three teams whose primary conference is not the Atlantic Coast Conference. Since joining this conference in 2003, the team has won the conference championship four times, in 2004–05, 2006–07, 2007–08, and again in 2012–13. The team previously played in the Division III

Mason-Dixon Collegiate Hockey Association The Mason-Dixon Collegiate Hockey Association (MDCHA) is an ACHA Division III club ice hockey league that comprises smaller colleges and universities in the Mid-Atlantic region USA. Division III club hockey offers smaller colleges and universitie ...

, where it won the league championship in 1997, 1999, and 2000. In 2001 and 2002, they were invited to the national tournament of the American Collegiate Hockey Association, which the team had joined in 1999. Coach Brad Card now leads the team, taking over the bench for Coach John Kokidko. The team plays its home matches at the

Washington Capitals The Washington Capitals (colloquially known as the Caps) are a professional ice hockey team based in Washington, D.C. The team competes in the National Hockey League (NHL) as a member of the Metropolitan Division in the Eastern Conference, a ...

' practice arena,

Kettler Capitals Iceplex MedStar Capitals Iceplex is the practice arena of the Washington Capitals of the National Hockey League. The highest ice rink above street-level in the United States, it is located on the eighth floor atop the parking garage adjoining the Ballston ...

Ballston, Arlington, Virginia Ballston is a neighborhood in Arlington County, Virginia. Ballston is located at the western end of the Rosslyn-Ballston corridor. It is a major transportation hub and boasts one of the nation's highest concentrations of scientific research agenci ...

at the

Ballston Common Mall Ballston Quarter, formerly known as Ballston Common Mall, originally opened as Parkington Shopping Center, was one of the first major suburban shopping centers in the Washington, D.C., area. It opened in 1951 and was the nation's first shopping ce ...

Athletic directors

After

Bernard Muir Bernard Montgomery Muir (born July 22, 1968) is an American college athletics administrator who is currently the athletic director at Stanford University. Prior to Stanford, Muir served in the same position at the University of Delaware and George ...

left the position as the Director of the Athletic Department on May 11, 2009, a year long search for a replacement began. Dr. Daniel R. Porterfield, Senior Vice President for Strategic Development, served as Interim Director of Athletics beginning June 3, 2009, until Lee Reed took the position on April 15, 2010.

In popular culture

With the rise of Georgetown's men's basketball team in the 1980s, the Hoyas became increasingly associated with the Black community in the United States and in the Washington, DC, area in particular. Consequently, Georgetown came to be referenced in work by African-American artists, including Spike Lee's ''

She's Gotta Have It ''She's Gotta Have It'' is a 1986 American black-and-white comedy-drama film written, produced, edited and directed by Spike Lee. Filmed on a small budget and Lee's first feature-length film to be released, it earned positive reviews and lau ...

'', Outkast's ''

Aquemini ''Aquemini'' is the third studio album by American hip hop duo Outkast. It was released on September 29, 1998, by LaFace Records. The title is a portmanteau of the two performers' Zodiac signs: Aquarius (Big Boi) and Gemini (André 3000), whic ...

'' and Jay-Z's '' Kingdom Come''.

References

External links

* {{good article