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.
Georgetown Hoyas
Georgetown's ice hockey team plays in the ACHA Division II in the Atlantic Coast Collegiate Hockey League (ACCHL) as one of three teams whose primary conference is not the Atlantic Coast Conference. Since joining this conference in 2003, the team has won the conference championship four times, in 2004-05, 2006–07, 2007–08, and again in 2012-13. The team previously played in the Division III Mason-Dixon Collegiate Hockey Association, where it won the league championship in 1997, 1999, and 2000. In 2001 and 2002, they were invited to the national tournament of the American Collegiate Hockey Association, which the team had joined in 1999. Coach Brad Card now leads the team, taking over the bench for Coach John Kokidko. The team plays its home matches at the Washington Capitals' practice arena, Kettler Capitals Iceplex in Ballston, Arlington, Virginia at the Ballston Common Mall.