Know your foe: Akron

I hope I don't get lazy with these (and I REALLY hope I can manage to do this for basketball).

History: The University of Akron was founded in 1870 by a man named John R. Butchel, a businessman who made many investments in agriculture and manufacturing.  It was affiliated with the Universalist Church (interesting how prominent that church used to be back then) until 1907 when it became nonsectarian due to the school wanting to focus more on local issues.  The school was private until 1913 until the school board sold the school to the city  of Akron, Ohio after which point the school grew exponentially from about 200 students to 10,000 students just 50 years later.  This is probably due to Akron being a hub for tire manufacturing, and Akron began offering rubber-based courses.  By 1967, University System of Ohio took the school over.

Once the rubber industry left Akron, the school took over as a center for polymer research, and houses the largest center in the world for polymer research.  In fact, the Polymer Innovation Center just broke ground last year.

The school burned down twice: once in 1897 (the original building) and once in 1971.

Location: Akron, Ohio.  The city was founded in 1825 and was named for the Greek word for "summit" which became the name for the county Akron is in.  In 1854, what would eventually become Quaker Oats started in Akron.  By 1936, the rubber industry called Akron home with companies like Goodyear and Firestone calling Akron home then (the real question is how many actual plants are left there?  Probably zero; Goodyear's the only one still there).  From 1910 to 1920 it was the fastest growing city in America.  Of all the companies that started there, Goodyear is the only one left sadly (the Pretenders wrote a song of its decay).  Now it's main export is LeBron, something we hardly have much respect for these days.  Supposedly, the waffle cone was invented there, although there probably are about 50 other places that claim it these days.

Academics: Akron is placed as a Tier 4 school by US News & World Reports, but they do rank their engineering program in the top 5 nationally (I find that hard to believe, but I'm getting my info from Wikipedia.  Hey, I'm not trying to write a thesis here).  Organizational Psych is 6th nationally.  The current enrollment is 23,777.  They bring in the 6th most revene for technology licensing in the nation for colleges without med schools.  And of course, the polymer research brings it lots of money as well.

Famous Alumni: Ohio State coach Jim Tressel went to grad school at Akron and got his first job as a graduate assistant from 1974 to 1978.  Most of the other famous alumni went on to have their careers associated with football.  The only really famous current players who went there were Jason Taylor and Dwight Smith, but some other names you may or may not have heard of are Charlie Frye, although Eddie Elias, the founder of the PBA (which ESPN stupidly decides to show instead of college lax) went there as well.  And of course, what would Goodyear be without its CEO going to Akron?  The author of the childrens' series The Sisters Grimm and N.E.R.D.S. went there.  The last famous guy you may have heard of is George Wallace.  Not the governor, but the comedian (Comedy Central thinks he's the 93rd best stand-up comedian of all time).

Mascot, logos, and fight song: In the 1920s and 1930s, Goodrich made a bunch of very popular rubber shoes that were called Zippers.  When the school polled students for a mascot name, the Zippers won.  For awhile, a frat started a rumor that they were named after the zippers on our pants, but that was just a practical joke.  Because of this, in 1950, the school shortened the name to the Zips.  In 1953, the school brought a committee to decide on a mascot, and they decided on Mr. Zip the Kangaroo because "the kangaroo is fast, agile, and powerful with undying determination – all the necessary qualities of an athlete," according to Akron's website, but ESPN's college football encyclopedia said the student body president got the idea from the comic strip "Kicky the Kangaroo."  Still, with the kangaroo, it's hard to imagine it associating with a zipper, but kangaroos do have pouches, and pouches have zippers, so, yeah.  Anyway, Zippy is actually female.

The helmet features a letter "A" with the cross being part of Zippy, and has been in use since 2003.  Until the 1960s, players just wore a blue and gold helmet with their number on it.  From then on they experimented with various "As"  They used things from a block A with a shadow, usually later on, as well as an A in a similar font to the Y in the BYU logo.  They even wore yellow (officially "mustard" - why are so many schools afraid to call their yellow color by its proper name?) helmets at one point, but looking at those pictures I found them ugly.

Akron's fight song is called "Akron Blue and Gold" (oh, and their colors are *yawn* Blue and Gold)

(Chorus):

"We cheer the Akron Blue and Gold,
We cheer as the colors unfold.
We pledge anew, we're all for you,
As the team goes crashing through,
Fight! Fight!
We cheer the Akron warriors bold,
For a fight that's a sight to behold,
So we stand up, cheer and shout,
For the Akron Blue and Gold."

"Zzzip! Zip go the Zippers!
Zzzip! Zip go the Zippers!
Akron true,
Gold and Blue,
All for you, and the Zippers too!"

(Chorus)

Athletics: Akron has been in Division I since 1980, playing as a I-AA independent in football initially, then as a I-A independent since 1987.  They played in the Mid-America Conference since 1992.  In basketball, they were members of the Ohio Valley Conference until 1992, when they joined the MAC.  All of their biggest games were before this era.

Akron football only began playing in Division I in 1980, but before then they were coached early in their history by the legendary John Heisman, if only for one year (in between stints at the Oberlin school).  In 1987 they made the jump to Division I-A, reaching their peak in the 1992 season under coach Gene Faust with a 7-3-1 record.  However, they were not invited to a bowl that year.  The only year they went to a bowl was in 2005 (when they won the MAC title); they lost the Motor City Bowl to Memphis. Their current coach is Rob Ianello and they play in InfoCision Stadium - Summa Field, which replaced the old Rubber Bowl.

In basketball, they joined the Ohio Valley Conference when their Division I program began in 1980 (before that they played D-II), then moved to the MAC in 1992.  They won the 1986 OVC regular season and tournament championships and the 2009 MAC tournament title; those were their only two NCAA appearances.  Their best eras were under Bob Huggins in the 1980s and currently under Keith Dambrot.  Joe Jakubick and Bill Turner were their best players.  They play in James A. Rhodes Arena.

Recently, the soccer team has experienced some success as well, being ranked #1 in the nation for most of 2009 and losing the national title game to Virginia.

Sadly, Akron has no lacrosse team.

Rival: Akron's fiercest rival is Kent State, 14 miles away.  They first played football in 1923 and started playing for the Wagon Wheel trophy in 1946.  Considering both schools are local, many of the opposing fans know each other.  Akron currently leads the series 26-19-2 in football.  In basketball, they knocked each other out of the 2007 and 2008 MAC tournaments.

Outlook: This should be an interesting way to start the season; start with a somewhat mediocre non-AQ team to test Syracuse's mettle.  Of course, recent years have shown that there are no gimme wins.  I'm not going to make any predictions, but I will get a GO ORANGE!  #BeatAkron!

(PS: Can someone please tell me how to wrap text around the pics?  Thanks.)