What’s fun about the Cornell rivalry is when their faithful appear at Colgate for the home game of a series. There are a lot of them with their pep band - it’s a big school, after all- and bigger than Colgate, Union, Clarkson and RPI combined- and they do enjoy their hockey, win or lose.
We at Colgate enjoy the competition. This year was interesting with a loss and a tie and yet Colgate made the tourney and the final with Harvard.
Anyway, and about the fall, what’s with Cornell football? Not as many supporters as one would expect for their home games given the size of that student body and hardly any at their away games at Colgate.
I believe that your undergrad school does matter but you are going to a wonderful school which will provide you with great research opportunities. If you succeed at Colgate you will be in fantastic shape for grad school or anything else you choose to do. Congratulations on your decision. Sometimes things do work out for the best.
Cornell has not historically been good at, or cared much about, football.
Sometimes it’s a nice diversion to sit in the stands on a nice fall day. But in that case, in my day at least, most people weren’t watching the game.
I may be mistaken but I think the whole Ivy league does not care much about football, with these exceptions:
The Harvard-Yale game.Which is not really about football, in the end.
for the longest time nobody want to lose to Columbia, since they never won.
Some of the halftime bands are pretty funny.
Those who like “rah rah” at Cornell mostly confine it to hockey. Or lacrosse to a lesser extent, when they are good. For a couple of very bizarre years basketball was really good, and drew big crowds I understand. But that was definitely a fluke.
There are certainly people at Cornell who are into sports, but also tons who could care less. My guess is Colgate probably has more in the fomer camp, percentage-wise.
Cornell fans are rabid about hockey though, and they do travel all over for that. Particularly for schools that are easier to get to, more fans would likely show up. That does not mean they consider these “rivalry” games. They do the same exact thing at all the other schools they play, too. In hockey they consider the Harvard games their rivalry games. They do not consider games played against : Colgate, or St. Lawrence, or RPI, or Union, to be “rivalry games”. Or any different from each other. They are just “games”. To them.
Of course the percentage of students who support varsity athletics is larger at Colgate. We have 25 varsity sports, about 70% of all students participate in club, intramural and varsity sports and a student body of 2950 on this relatively small and contained pedestrian campus. Cornell’s is a different proposition.
We like a competition- whether in league or out of league, Patriot League, ECAC or otherwise. And we hold a special regard for Cornell.