Name-a-Day Calendar, August 11: St. Francis Brooklyn Terriers
Page 278 of 365
Chosen in: 1933
Chosen by: The school athletic association
The school we’re likely soon to forget as St. Francis College was originally founded as St. Francis Academy in 1859. It took its current name in 1884 and began playing men’s basketball in 1896, the first college in New York City to do so.
St. Francis’ team was originally called the Boys from Brooklyn. As St. Francis College was an all-boys school until 1969, there were no accompanying Girls from Brooklyn.
In 1933, the school’s athletic association introduced their first mascot, Rocky the Terrier, and the men’s basketball team became known as the Terriers from then on. I want to assume the original Rocky was a live terrier, but I can’t find any information confirming or denying this. The modern mascot was a costumed terrier.
I use the past tense there because, in case you’re somehow not already familiar, St. Francis College eliminated all intercollegiate athletics following the 2022-23 academic year. As of July 1, the St. Francis Brooklyn Terriers are no more.
When this announcement came in March, a lot of people lamented that the Terriers never made the men’s NCAA Tournament despite playing major college basketball since the Tournament was introduced in 1939. And as sad as that is, the postseason fate of the women’s team might be even sadder. St. Francis Brooklyn began playing intercollegiate women’s basketball in 1973, meaning that they were also eligible for every women’s NCAA Tournament, as that bracket debuted in 1982. The Terriers found themselves in the women’s field exactly once; they earned the Northeast Conference autobid in 2015. As a 16-seed, they faced Breanna Stewart and eventual champion UConn, who gobbled them up by the score of 89-33.1
That is the legacy of the Terrier: cancelled before its climax like a Netflix drama that wasn’t doing big enough numbers. We can only pray for the reboot and hope that one day St. Francis Brooklyn will give sports another chance.
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UConn scored 47 points in the first half alone. At least the Terriers can say they hit more three-pointers (seven to UConn’s five).