Georgetown Hoyas
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 Greek "hoia" or "hoya", meaning "what" or "such", and the Latin "saxa" to form "Hoya Saxa!", 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 Capital One Arena, has disputed the Greek and Latin origin, suggesting the classical words were retroactively applied to a nonsensical cheer.
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", 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.
2013–14 Georgetown Hoyas men's basketball team
Losers of four in a row and five of their last six, the Hoyas came home to host the first ranked opponent of their conference season, No. 9 Villanova. Their depleted roster received a reinforcement for the game when Jabril Trawick returned to action; he had recovered more quickly than expected from his broken jaw and missed only five games because of the injury, and he played 12 minutes against the Wildcats. But John Thompson III also had to deal with another player loss, when back-up center Moses Ayegba received a one-game NCAA suspension less than three hours before game time because of a pre-enrollment infraction. The game had no flow, with the teams combining for 34 turnovers (18 by Georgetown) and 39 fouls to go with their 41 field goals. Amid the frequent stoppages of play, Georgetown scored the game's first eight points, giving the Hoyas what turned out to be their largest lead of the game. The Wildcats took advantage of a big disparity in free throw opportunities, going 22-for-28 (79 percent) from the line while Georgetown went 8-for-9 (89 percent). Villanova led 35–30 at the half, but Georgetown came back repeatedly to tie the game in the second half at 35–35, 37–37, 39–39, and 43–43 before Villanova pulled ahead for good with 10:04 to play. The Wildcats stretched their lead to as many as five points, but the Hoyas closed to 61–58 with 2:08 remaining before Villanova used free throws to close out a 65–60 victory. Markel Starks had 20 points for the Hoyas and Reggie Cameron had 12, but the Hoyas went down to their fifth straight defeat, tying the longest losing streak of John Thompson III's ten-season tenure at Georgetown set in 2011; it also was their third straight home loss, giving them their longest home losing streak since 2009. They had lost six of the seven games they played after Joshua Smith's departure and seven of their last eleven.