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.
2009–10 Georgetown Hoyas men's basketball team
Georgetown's deep Big East Tournament run gave the Hoyas a 23–10 record and made the case for the team's inclusion in the 2010 NCAA Tournament. Georgetown was seeded third in the Midwest Regional in the Hoyas′ first appearance in the tournament since 2008. Observers considered the Hoyas a legitimate Final Four threat, and Georgetown was the heavy favorite in its first-round game against 14th-seeded Ohio, a team that had posted a losing regular-season record in the Mid-American Conference (MAC) but had earned a tournament berth by winning the MAC Tournament championship. The day before the game, John Thompson III said that the Hoyas were playing their best basketball of the season, but behind a 32-point effort by junior guard Armon Bassett, 23 points by freshman guard D. J. Cooper, and a strong team three-point shooting performance, the Bobcats jumped out to an early lead that Georgetown was never able to close. Ohio led 48–36 at halftime and by as many as 19 points in the second half, and a second-half Georgetown offensive surge got the Hoyas no closer than seven points despite Chris Wright's team-leading 28 points, Greg Monroe's double-double (19 points and 13 rebounds), and Hollis Thompson's 16-point performance. Ohio cruised to a shocking 97–83 upset victory, the first time the Bobcats had won an NCAA Tournament game since 1983, and Georgetown's season came to a sudden and unexpected end.