USC Trojans:
So why does USC name its team after losers? And not only that, but why did the Trojans lose? Because they were dumb and gullible. What kind of mascot is that?
UPDATE: USC lawprof Howard Gillman points to this explanation (emphasis added):
Originally, the teams of the University of Southern California were referred to as Methodists or Wesleyans, names not favored by university officials. The director of athletics, Warren Bovard, son of university president Dr. George Bovard, asked Owen Bird, a sportswriter for the LA Times, to give the university a new nickname. Although we now are proud of a winning tradition, the USC family was not always successful during the early years. In fact, we were named "Trojans" because we were great losers. Bird dubbed the USC team "Trojans" instead of "Methodists" because he compared our players in 1912 to noble Trojan warriors. His reasons for using the term were that "At this time, the athletes and coaches of the university were under terrific handicaps. They were facing teams that were bigger and better-equipped, yet they had splendid fighting spirit. The name 'Trojans' fitted them. ... I came out with an article prior to a showdown between USC and Stanford in which I called attention the fighting spirit of USC athletes and named them 'Trojan' all the time, and it stuck. ... The term 'Trojan' as applied to USC means to me that no matter what the situation, what the odds or what the conditions, the completion must be carried on to the end and those who strive must give all the have and never be weary in doing so." ...So they admit it! But I agree that the USC Methodists would be an even odder name for a football team.
FURTHER UPDATE: The Llama Butchers (?) comments: "Two! Four! Six! Eight! Who Got Tricked And Opened Their Gate?"
Animals - Lions, Tigers, Jaguars, Eagles. Mostly on the verge of extinction. Losers...
Indians, Chiefs, Redskins - Both not PC and losers...
Steelers, Packers - Now outsourced, mostly, losers...
New Orleans Saints, New England Patriots - Arguably now quite anachronistic.
Seems to me that it's the rare team that's *not* named after losers.
Perhaps T.S. Eliot high school's team would be the "Maculate Giraffes."
The Trojan war lasted ten years, and seriously - If a football team possessed the fighting spirit of a group of warriors who fought ten years, they would possess greater spirit than any other football team. We may all believe that at some level, the victory is the thing; But in reality, whether the Trojans ultimately won or lost is only one datum.
If the Spartans had lost, I think "Spartan" would still be a complimentary word in a battle context.
I attended UCLA part-time while I was in high school, and USC for one year before I ran out of money. The real reason that USC named its team the Trojans was because they were being nice to UCLA--we wanted to make it easy for them to come up with "Trojans burst under pressure" when the cross-town rivalry reached its peak each year.
There was a rumor at Northwestern that we were once called the "Fighting Methodists." That certainly would've been way awesomer than the "Wildcats." Why even bother with a nickname if that's all you're going to do? Why not just the Northwestern Northwesterners? (Or Northwestern Midwesterners).
How about the PLU Lutes?
http://www.plu.edu
So offensive to the eye
Stands a Cal extension campus
Known as Westwood High
Home to all the Bruin bearcubs
UGLY is it's name
The student body's vile
The campus is a pile
And the football team's a shame
U
G
L
Y
U-G-L-Y EAT MY SHORTS!
(Sung by my obnoxious Trojan-educated wife every once in a while - to the tune of the UCLA fight song)
Looks like none of the Wesleyan colleges or universities out there have gone with Methodists as their team name. Or "Southern Californians" for that matter.
But for the Professor's statement: "So why does USC name its team after losers? And not only that, but why did the Trojans lose? Because they were dumb and gullible."
No way. The Trojans were the good guys. Defending themselves against bandits. Hector was the real hero and Achilles a spoiled brat of a rapist and killer. Hector's exchange with Andromache is the most touching passage in all poetry. If you want to push it, what did the "winners" get out of it? Achilles got killed by Paris; Agamemnon by his wife; Menelaus spent 10 years on a Mediteranean cruise with his wife (only maybe a little bit better than being axed); Odysseus did the same only to come back home alone, having lost all his ships and men, wipe out the next generation of his nobles and have to go into exile for expiation. Give me the Trojans over the Achaeans any time.
Because Troy was regarded by as having occupied the center of the known world it has been sought as the point of origin for significant civilizations in Western history. It's really no wonder that USC would continue the trend.
And haughty Bruins' unrelenting hate,
Expell'd and exil'd, left the South Central shore.
With all due respect my ruin friend, the Trojans are the foundation of the greatest empire in all the world, and the baby bears, are well, little.
You also needed to pay the gatesman an outrageous sum in gold.
Noah
And, what's with the Hoyas?
...just about anyone beats the (aptly named) NYU Violets.
I mean, sure, none of us wants to appear to eager to compliment the good Professor lest we be seen intemperate or, worse, fawning. But come on! That was funny!
Argh!
There was a famed offensive line at Georgetown in the early years of the 20th Century. Adoring fans would cheer their heroes by chanting "Hoia Saxe"--what rocks (an ungodly mixture of Greek and Latin, as well as trademark infringement of Fordham's Seven Blocks of Granite).
Georgetown students, displying the stunning lack of spelling prowess that remains to this day, rendered "Hoia" into "Hoya", for marketing purposes.
I still don't know what's up with the bulldog...