From Aggies to Zips

[sigma7]

So I've been hammering away at Excel to whip up a list of colleges and nicknames. I don't know Excel well enough, and I figured it'd be an interesting exercise to come up with a list and frequency for collegiate nicknames -- we know there are more Wildcats than Owls, but how many?

Armed with the data from this Web site, made a spreadsheet, then spent a while trying to create an intelligent count of the unique nicknames. That took me the longest time, but having solved it, I'd like to share my findings.

There were 1617 nicknames, 539 distinct -- some schools (like Georgia Tech and Hofstra) have multiple nicknames, and some schools have different nicknames for gendered sports teams (Lyon College, University of Central Arkansas) and even different sports (the Haverford College baseball team is the Black Squirrels). There are 354 mascots unique to their college, from the Ambassadors to the Zips. Your top ten mascots are the Eagles (61), Panthers (52), Tigers (45), Bulldogs (39), Wildcats (37), Lions (34), Cougars (32), Pioneers [!] (31), Warriors (30) and Knights (26). There are still teams called the Red Men (Carthage College; Carthago delenda est?) and the Redmen (University of Rio Grande), five Indians, and one Seminoles. Seven teams are in some way purple, 22 red, 35 blue, five black, 53 gold, seven green, 18 yellow, and one white -- the White Mules of Colby College, Waterville, Maine. There are two Bees, one Super Bees, one Maccabees. Two Squirrels, one Black Squirrels (as above).

Disclaimers: "Fighting" has been dropped from the nicknames. Geographically distinct campuses get counted as separate colleges (Davenport University accounts for 20 of the 52 Panthers). There are 160 colleges tabulated that have no official nickname, including several incarnations of DeVry University. Surely they should be the Infomercials.

Comments

[sigma7.livejournal.com]

Heh -- I've been very lucky to have been a large feline, in one variant or another, since first grade (Lion, then Tiger, and Wildcat since). I may have been a Viking in kindergarten, though. (Which reminds me of Ralph Wiggum: "Oh boy, sleep! That's where I'm a viking!")

[dvandom.livejournal.com]

My gradeschool had school colors (blue and gold), but no mascot at the time, unless you count Saint Mary. Junior high was the Cardinals (red and black), and it fed into a high school that was also the Cardinals (red and white). College was the Bulldogs (purple and white...ironically a different middle school in my hometown had that mascot and colors), grad school was the Buckeyes, postdoc the Spartans, and currently the Wildcats. Whee.

[nsempress.livejournal.com]

I was a Ram twice (HS and during grad school Round 1), and I think in elementary school I was a Bulldog and a Falcon, which was... okay. I'm still trying to figure out the point of a mascot for elementary schools, because... they don't really have a function.

Being a Viking any time would be cool-- I've spent a couple years contemplating a Valkyrie Halloween costume, just because Vikings are awesome.