Name-a-Day Calendar, April 5: Loyola (MD) Greyhounds
Page 150 of 365
Chosen in: 1927
Chosen by: Student body vote
Loyola University Maryland has played men’s basketball since 1908, its first teams using a hodgepodge of unofficial nicknames relating to the school’s founding, such as “Jesuits” and “Irishmen”. By 1927, the students wanted a true mascot, and so the school held a contest to decide on an official one.
The mascot needed to work with the school’s established green/gray color scheme, so most of the suggestions were animals that were known to display either of these colors, the most prominent being the parrot (green) and the grey squirrel (take a guess). But only one suggestion took the school’s Irish Catholic history into account: the greyhound, which was often imported by ancient Roman as a racing dog and more recently bred by the Irish.
The final student body vote was between “Greyhounds” and “Grey Squirrels”. The former won by a slim margin.
Loyola’s costumed greyhound mascot is named Iggy, after Ignatius of Loyola, founder of the Society of Jesus (more commonly known as the Jesuits). He’s on Twitter (the mascot, not the long-dead saint).
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