RIT Tigers

RIT Tigers
UniversityRochester Institute of Technology
NCAADivision III
Division I (ice hockey only)
Conference
Athletic directorJacqueline Nicholson
LocationHenrietta, New York
Varsity teams22
Basketball arenaClark Gymnasium
Ice hockey arenaGene Polisseni Center
Soccer stadiumTiger Stadium
Aquatics centerJudson Pool
Lacrosse stadiumTiger Stadium
Rowing venueGosnell Boathouse
Other venuesFrank Ritter Memorial Ice Arena
NicknameTigers
ColorsOrange, white, and black[1]
     
MascotRITchie
Websiteritathletics.com

The RIT Tigers are composed of 22 teams representing the Rochester Institute of Technology in intercollegiate athletics, including men's and women's basketball, crew, cross country, cheerleading, ice hockey, lacrosse, soccer, swimming & diving, tennis, and track and field. Men's sports include baseball and wrestling. Women's sports include softball, and volleyball. The Tigers compete in the NCAA Division III and are members of the Liberty League for all sports except ice hockey, which competes in NCAA Division I. The men's and women's ice hockey teams are members of Atlantic Hockey America, formed by the 2024 merger of the Tigers' former hockey homes of the men-only Atlantic Hockey Association and the women-only College Hockey America.[2]

Teams

Men's sports Women's sports
Baseball Basketball
Basketball Rowing
Rowing Cross country
Cross country Ice hockey
Ice hockey Lacrosse
Lacrosse Soccer
Soccer Softball
Swimming & diving Swimming & diving
Tennis Tennis
Track & field1 Track & field1
Wrestling Volleyball
1 – includes both indoor and outdoor.

Men's basketball

Men's basketball at RIT started with the 1915–16 season. In the 1955–56 season under coach A. Leo Fox, they went undefeated with 17 wins and 0 losses, success that led local media to dub the team "Tigers". (The college then adopted the nickname for all athletic teams, replacing "Techmen".)

They participated in the NCAA Division III men's basketball tournament in 1976, 1995, 1996, 1997, 1999, 2000, and 2009.[3]

The Tigers were coached by Bob McVean for 40 seasons from 1983 to 2024. For three seasons in a row from 1994 to 1997, McVean earned EAA Coach of the Year honors as the Tigers finished with 20 or more wins and qualified for the NCAA tournament each year.[4]

Coaching history as of 2026[3][4]
Coach Dates Wins Losses Win %
(No coach) 1915–1916 9 12 0.429
V. Croop 1916–1918 11 6 0.647
(No record) 1918–1919 – – –
Harold Brodie 1919–1920 10 8 0.556
Arthur McCrain 1920–1921 4 11 0.267
Peasley 1921–1922 – – –
Robert McKay[a] 1922–1923 4 8 0.333
Bill Thompson 1923–1924 5 13 0.278
Carl Beghold 1924–1925 1 13 0.071
Robert McKay[a] 1925–1934 71 76 0.483
Perk Cohen 1934–1937 18 21 0.462
John Elberfeld 1937–1940 14 28 0.333
A. Leo Fox[b] 1940–1956 115 79 0.593
Lou Alexander 1956–1968 120 146 0.451
Bill Carey 1968–1980 162 124 0.566
Bill Nelson 1980–1983 40 36 0.526
Bob McVean 1983–2024 556 490 0.531
Dominic Parker 2024–present 14 36 0.280
Total 1,083 1,107 0.495
  1. ^ a b Robert McKay had two non-continuous terms as coach. His overall win-loss record is 75–84 (0.472).
  2. ^ No team from 1942 to 1946 due to World War II

Women's basketball

Women's basketball began at RIT with their first varsity match on January 6, 1988, when they lost to the Brockport Golden Eagles 73–39. Their first postseason appearance took place in the 2007 Empire 8 tournament. They appeared in the NCAA Division III tournament in 2017, 2018, and 2019.[5]

Coaching history as of 2022[5]
Coach Dates Wins Losses Win %
Mark Storm 1987–1989 8 31 0.205
Nelson Miles 1989–1995 16 124 0.114
Julie Diehl 1995–1996 7 17 0.292
Laura Hungerford 1996–2001 21 101 0.172
Jeff McCaffery 2001–2002 1 23 0.042
Debbie Buff 2002–2008 51 83 0.381
Rob Peterson 2007–2008 7 10 0.412
Amy Reed 2008–present 175 164 0.516
Total 286 553 0.341

Football

RIT had an early football team that ceased playing circa 1922. In 1968, a club football team was formed, and in 1971, football became a university-sanctioned sport as the team joined NCAA Division II.[6] They moved to NCAA Division III in 1973.[7] In January 1978, after seven seasons, RIT discontinued its football program on the basis that they would not be able to commit sufficient funding to the team.[6]

Coaching history[7]
Coach Dates Wins Losses Ties Win %
Tom Coughlin 1971–1973 12 12 2 0.500
Lou Spiotti 1974–1977 6 20 0 0.231
Total 18 32 2 0.365

Men's ice hockey

Main article: RIT Tigers men's ice hockey

The men's ice hockey at RIT dates back to an amateur team founded by an RIT student in 1957. Men's ice hockey became a varsity sport at RIT when they debuted in NCAA Division II in the 1962–63 season.[8] They won the 1983 NCAA Division II tournament and the 1985 NCAA Division III tournament. They moved up to NCAA Division I for the 2005–06 season.[9]

Women's ice hockey

Main article: RIT Tigers women's ice hockey

The RIT women's hockey team began with the 1975–76 season. They won the 2012 NCAA Division III tournament before moving up to NCAA Division I the following season. They now compete in College Hockey America, part of NCAA Division I.

Men's lacrosse

The RIT Tigers men's lacrosse team dates back to 1964, when a lacrosse club was organized on campus. The club played their first season in the spring of 1966.[10] In 1968, men's lacrosse became a university-sanctioned sport and the Tigers played their first season in NCAA Division II. They moved down to Division III beginning with the 1974 season.[11]

In 2021, the RIT Tigers won the 2021 NCAA Division III tournament, defeating the Salisbury Sea Gulls in the championship game to cap off an undefeated season.[12] The team would repeat as national champions in 2022 when they defeated Union College, 12–10.[13]

Coaching history as of 2022[14]
Coach Dates Wins Losses Win %
Ralph Armstrong 1968–1970 19 10 0.655
Bruce Babcock 1971 5 6 0.454
Bruce Opalka 1972 0 13 0.000
George McGraw 1973 2 12 0.142
A. J. Russo 1974–1975 14 12 0.538
Fred Recchio 1976–1978 19 19 0.500
Ray Rostan 1979–1981 25 15 0.625
Bill Tierney 1982–1984 34 7 0.829
Bill Glennon 1985–1988 48 14 0.436
Guy Van Arsdale 1989–2000 112 54 0.674
Andy Cooney 2001 7 7 0.500
Gene Peluso 2002–2009 88 45 0.661
Jake Coon 2010–present 228 24 0.905
Total 601 238 0.716

Men's soccer

RIT's men's soccer team records go back to 1960. They play in NCAA Division III. As of 2021, their best performance in the NCAA Division III men's soccer tournament came in 1988, when they lost 3–0 in the final game to the UC San Diego Tritons.[15]

Coaching history as of 2022[15]
Coach Dates Wins Losses Ties Win %
Jim Dickie 1960–1971 69 69 12 0.500
Bill Nelson 1972–1979 38 67 16 0.380
Doug May 1980–1995 196 56 24 0.753
Bill Garno 1996–present 204 186 48 0.520
Total 507 378 100 0.573

Women's soccer

RIT's women's soccer team dates back to 1982.[16] They play in NCAA Division III.[17]

Coaching history as of 2022[16]
Coach Dates Wins Losses Ties Win %
Paul Caraci 1982–1987 39 52 7 0.433
Jon Poulakis 1988–1991 33 33 3 0.500
Abby Steele 1992–1995 21 34 6 0.393
Tom Natalie 1996–2009 106 115 19 0.481
Liz Masterson 2010–present 110 63 30 0.615
Total 309 297 65 0.510

Wrestling

Wrestling at RIT has had a storied history, beginning with the 1927-28 season.[18] RIT has had four total individual NCAA Division III champions, with five titles total.[19] RIT's best overall team place finish in the NCAA Division III Championships was in 2022, where the team placed seventh.[20]

History

RIT was a long-time member of the Empire 8, an NCAA Division III athletic conference, but moved to the Liberty League beginning with the 2011–12 academic year. All of RIT's teams compete at the Division III level, with the exception of the men's and women's ice hockey programs, which play at the Division I level. In 2010, the men's ice hockey team was the first ever from the Atlantic Hockey conference to reach the NCAA tournament semi-finals: The Frozen Four.[21]

On March 17, 2012, the women's ice hockey team, after finishing the regular season with a record of 28–1–1, won its first NCAA Division III national championship, defeating the defending champion Norwich University 4–1. The women's team had carried a record of 54–3–3 over their past 2 regular seasons leading up to that point.[22] Three days later, RIT successfully applied for the women's hockey team to move from Division III to Division I. Starting in the 2012–13 season, the women's team joined the College Hockey America conference, and was eligible for conference postseason play, but not NCAA postseason play. The moratorium on the NCAA postseason was lifted 2 years later beginning with the 2014–15 season.[23]

Additionally, RIT has a wide variety of club, intramural, and pick-up sports and teams to provide a less-competitive recreational option to students.

Tom Coughlin, coach of the NFL's 2008 and 2012 Super Bowl champion New York Giants, taught physical education and coached the RIT Men's Varsity Football team in the 1970s.

Since 1968 the school's hockey teams played at Frank Ritter Memorial Ice Arena on campus, but in 2010, the school launched the "Power Play" campaign, in which it hoped to raise 15 of the 30 million dollars it would cost to build a new arena.[24] On November 11, 2011 it was announced that B. Thomas Golisano and the Polisseni Foundation were donating 4.5 million to the new arena, which came to be named the Gene Polisseni Center.[25] The new 4,300 seat arena was completed in 2014 and the Men's and Women's teams moved into the new facility in September for the 2014–15 season.

Championships

NCAA team national championships
Year Sport Division
1983 Men's hockey II
1985 Men's hockey III
2012 Women's hockey III
2021 Men's lacrosse III
2022 Men's lacrosse III
NCAA individual national championships
Year Sport Athlete Division
1976 Men's Outdoor Track and Field Mark Stebbins, 400-meter intermediate hurdles[26] III
1978 Men's Outdoor Track and Field Mark Stebbins, 400-meter intermediate hurdles[27] III
1982 Swimming and Diving Barry Zacharias, 400-yard individual medley[28] III
1983 Wrestling Darryl Leslie, 142-Pound Weight Class[29] III
1986 Women's Outdoor Track and Field Michele Jones, 100-meter dash[30] III
1997 Wrestling Matt Hamill, 167-Pound Weight Class[31] III
1998 Wrestling Matt Hamill, 190-Pound Weight Class[32] III
1999 Wrestling Matt Hamill, 197-Pound Weight Class[33] III
2026 Wrestling Josh Harkness, 285-Pound Weight Class[34] III

Mascot

RIT's athletics nickname is the "Tigers", a name given following the undefeated men's basketball season of 1955–56. Prior to that, RIT's athletic teams were called the "Techmen" and had blue and silver as the sports colors. In 1963, RIT purchased a rescued Bengal tiger which became the Institute's mascot, named SPIRIT. He was taken to sports events until late spring, when he was moved to the Seneca Park Zoo. A year and a half later, when X-rays revealed he was suffering from genetic pelvic and leg joint problems, he was humanely euthanized.[37] The original tiger's pelt now resides in the school's archives at the on-campus library. RIT helped the Seneca Park Zoo purchase a new tiger shortly after SPIRIT's death, but it was not used as a school mascot. A metal sculpture in the center of the Henrietta campus now provides an everlasting version of the mascot.

RIT's team mascot is a version of this Bengal Tiger named RITchie. RITchie was the selected name entered in 1989 by alumnus Richard P. Mislan [38] during a College Activities Board "Name the RIT Tiger" contest. After it was announced that the RIT men's hockey team was moving from Division III to Division I in 2005, RITchie was redesigned and made his debut in the fall of 2006.

References

  1. ^ RIT Color Palette. Retrieved April 18, 2019.
  2. ^ "RIT Athletics". ritathletics.com. Retrieved February 7, 2016.
  3. ^ a b "Men's Basketball Records" (PDF). RIT Athletics. March 2025. Retrieved March 16, 2026.
  4. ^ a b "Men's Basketball Coach Bob McVean announces retirement". RIT Athletics. Rochester Institute of Technology. March 18, 2024. Retrieved April 10, 2024.
  5. ^ a b "Women's Basketball Records" (PDF). RIT Athletics. March 2022. Retrieved November 22, 2022.
  6. ^ a b "Grid program discontinued" (PDF). RIT News and Events. January 9, 1978. p. 10.
  7. ^ a b "RIT Football history". NCAA Statistics. Retrieved November 22, 2022.
  8. ^ "RIT Men's Ice Hockey History". NCAA Statistics. Retrieved November 21, 2022.
  9. ^ "Men's Hockey Going Division I".
  10. ^ Techmila '67 (PDF). Rochester Institute of Technology. 1967. p. 219.
  11. ^ "RIT Men's Lacrosse History". NCAA Statistics. Retrieved February 8, 2022.
  12. ^ Finnerty, Bob (June 2, 2021). "Celebrating the Tigers' national championship season". RIT. Retrieved February 8, 2022.
  13. ^ Mlodzinski, Mat (May 29, 2022). "RIT men's lacrosse repeats as Division III national champions". WHEC News10NBC. Retrieved May 30, 2022.
  14. ^ "Men's Lacrosse Records" (PDF). RIT Athletics. May 24, 2022. Retrieved November 21, 2022.
  15. ^ a b "RIT Men's Soccer Records" (PDF). RIT Athletics. December 2021. Retrieved November 21, 2022.
  16. ^ a b "RIT Women's Soccer Records" (PDF). RIT Athletics. December 2021. Retrieved November 21, 2022.
  17. ^ "RIT Women's Soccer History". NCAA Statistics. Retrieved November 21, 2022.
  18. ^ "Wrestling Record Book (PDF)" (PDF). Rochester Institute of Technology Athletics. Retrieved March 16, 2026.
  19. ^ "DIVISION III WRESTLING CHAMPIONSHIPS RECORDS BOOK" (PDF). NCAA. Retrieved March 16, 2026.
  20. ^ "DIVISION III WRESTLING CHAMPIONSHIPS RECORDS BOOK" (PDF). NCAA. Retrieved March 16, 2026.
  21. ^ "RIT – RIT downs UNH, reaches Frozen Four". ESPN.com. Retrieved March 28, 2010.
  22. ^ "RIT Women's Hockey wins NCAA Division III National Title". RIT Athletics. Retrieved March 30, 2012.
  23. ^ "RIT Women's Hockey Making Move To Division I". RIT Athletics. Retrieved March 30, 2012.
  24. ^ "RIT Power Play Campaign". Rochester Institute of Technology. Archived from the original on January 30, 2016. Retrieved March 30, 2012.
  25. ^ "Future RIT Hockey Arena to Become the Gene Polisseni Center".
  26. ^ "1976-D3TF-men-top6.pdf" (PDF). Pomona-Pitzer Athletics. Retrieved March 16, 2026.
  27. ^ "1978-D3TF-men-top6.pdf" (PDF). Pomona-Pitzer Athletics. Retrieved March 16, 2026.
  28. ^ "The Eighth Annual N.C.A.A. DIVISION III MEN'S SWIMMING and DIVING CHAMPIONSHIPS" (PDF). SwimSwam. Retrieved March 16, 2026.
  29. ^ "DIVISION III WRESTLING CHAMPIONSHIPS RECORDS BOOK" (PDF). NCAA. Retrieved March 16, 2026.
  30. ^ "1986_Women_W-D3TF-Results.pdf" (PDF). Pomona-Pitzer Athletics. Retrieved March 16, 2026.
  31. ^ "DIVISION III WRESTLING CHAMPIONSHIPS RECORDS BOOK" (PDF). NCAA. Retrieved March 16, 2026.
  32. ^ "DIVISION III WRESTLING CHAMPIONSHIPS RECORDS BOOK" (PDF). NCAA. Retrieved March 16, 2026.
  33. ^ "DIVISION III WRESTLING CHAMPIONSHIPS RECORDS BOOK" (PDF). NCAA. Retrieved March 16, 2026.
  34. ^ "Harkless wins 285 lb. National Championship". Rochester Institute of Technology Athletics. March 13, 2026. Retrieved March 16, 2026.
  35. ^ "RITchie – 1989". Retrieved September 15, 2020.
  36. ^ "RIT Art on Campus: Sculptures I". RIT Art on Campus. RIT. Retrieved September 15, 2020.
  37. ^ "RIT – 175 Year Anniversary". .rit.edu. Archived from the original on June 20, 2010. Retrieved July 24, 2010.
  38. ^ "Mislan Awards". .mislan.com. Retrieved August 4, 2012.

Further reading

  • Scott, Pitoniak (2015). Frozen in Time: the History of RIT Hockey. Rochester, NY: RIT Press. ISBN 978-1939125170.
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