Is Philadelphia becoming a college sports city?
It’s no secret that Philadelphia is a huge sports city. Philadelphia is one of the 13 US metro areas with all big 4 sports teams (baseball, football, basketball, hockey), all of which have some of the largest fan-bases in America. In addition, Philly has an MLS team, an arena football team, a former major league lacrosse team, and even a defunct lingerie football team (Though, to be fair, they played in South Jersey). All of these pro/semi-pro teams illustrate how sports-crazed the Philadelphia area is; so it’s shocking to think that until very recently, college sports in the Philadelphia area were often neglected. However, these past 8 months have changed that, as the rise of Temple football and Villanova’s march madness victory have made NCAA sports relevant in Philly again. With this in mind, I began to wonder — Is Philadelphia becoming a college sports city? Let’s take a closer look.
First of all, let’s consider where/why college sports are so popular. College sports are hugely popular in areas without professional teams, because the local NCAA teams act as quasi-professional sports teams to draw interest. One need look no further than schools in the SEC. Have any idea why the Crimson Tide, Gamecocks, Wild Cats, and Razorbacks are so popular in Alabama, South Carolina, Kentucky, and Arkansas respectively? It’s because all of those states don’t have NFL/NBA/MLB/(do you really think Southerners care about hockey?) teams, so it’s no surprise that a singular athletic identity that promotes state pride and interstate rivalry would be so popular.
Furthermore, SEC schools even dominate in popularity in states with pro teams. The Gators, Bulldogs, and Volunteers will always be more popular than pro teams in Florida, Georgia, and Tennessee, because those NCAA teams existed long before pro teams expanded into those states, so college teams are already established with multi generational fan support. This trend exceeds past the South too. Have any ideas why UCLA and USC football is popular in Los Angeles? It’s because LA has spent the past 20 years without an NFL team, so college football was the next best thing. Have any idea why schools in the northeast like Syracuse and UConn have such a widespread basketball fan base? It’s because upstate New York and Connecticut don’t have pro NBA teams, so they provide an alternative to NYC/Boston sports. The bottom line is that popular college sports teams act as an equivalent to pro teams.
With that in mind, it’s pretty easy to why Philadelphia has not traditionally been a college sports city. With the Phillies establishing their Philly roots in 1883, the Eagles in 1933, the 76ers in 1963 (and NBA basketball with the Warriors since 1946), and Flyers in 1967, Philadelphia has a long established relationship with its pro sports teams. Sure, college sports in schools like UPenn and St. Joes were a presence in the city of brotherly love, but pro sports dominated college athletics in Philadelphia. This is a trend you will often find in big, Northeastern cities. Pro athletic teams dominate in NYC over NCAA teams, to the point that New York University no longer even has a football team, due to a lack of interest and the financial burden of having a football team. Boston is another example. Boston College is a “power 5 school” in the NCAA, yet the Eagle’s popularity consistently dwarfs in comparison to Boston’s big four teams.
Even the aforementioned state/regional pride aspect of college sports does little to popularize college athletics in large cities. Penn State football has a history and pedigree of success, yet rarely makes a significant impact on the Philadelphia sports scene. Again, this is because cities tend to have rivalries with other cities, rather then states. Philadelphia vs. NYC or Chicago vs. St. Louis will always dominate over Pennsylvania vs. New York or Illinois vs. Missouri, because cities historically have had specific cultural identities to rival other cities. With all of that in mind, we can see why college sports have never been popular in Philadelphia, and how hard it would be to make collegiate sports relevant in big cities like Philadelphia.
Returning to the title of this article, we ask “Is Philadelphia becoming a college sports city?” Given the above, we can see the answer is probably not. Big cities are just too devoted to the professional teams to have significant interest in college athletics. However, that doesn’t mean that programs like Villanova basketball or Temple football can’t reverse that trend at least a little bit. Over the years, I have found that big personalities and winning are the two largest contributors to making a team popular and relevant to a media market. For example, the New Orleans Saints were on the verge of leaving Louisiana until Drew Brees arrived, got the team to a super bowl championship, and acted as a healer to New Orleans after the horrors of Hurricane Katrina. Today the Saints are cemented into New Orleans culture. More recently, the quick turnaround of Michigan football, led by genius/madman Jim Harbaugh has made Michigan football relevant not only in Michigan, but all across our national sports media.
With all that being said, are these elements coming through for Philly area collegiate sports? For success, the answer is an easy yes. Villanova winning the March Madness tournament is obviously a huge indicator of sucess and the final shot by Kris Jenkins to beat UNC will be well remembered in Philly sports lore for years to come. The same could be said for Temple football. They were nationally ranked for the first time since the Carter administration. They beat Penn State as underdogs to open the season, and were a score away from beating Notre Dame on Halloween night. Unfortunately, I don’t believe either team can make a lasting impression. Temple and Villanova don’t really have a big personality like a Jim Harbaugh or a Coach K to generate year round interest; so I imagine media coverage on the two teams will never be mainstream in the sports media, as with for example, a power 5 school.
Furthermore, Temple football would need to do much better in future years (like win bowl games year in and year out) to continue to remain relevant. Villanova has more lead-way by living off the sucess of the basketball team this year, but the championship won’t remain on people’s radar forever. If either team wants to remain popular in the Philadelphia media market, they need to win consistently, in order to maintain national media coverage. Remember, because Philly pro teams are already in the forefront of Philadelphia sports fans’ minds, Temple and Nova need increased coverage and sucess to begin to really gain popularity in Philly. Unfortunately, I don’t see that happening. Between having continued sucess annually and having regular media coverage in both the local and national level, I don’t see how Temple and Villanova can gain serious ground in making Philadelphia a college sports city. I’m not saying it’s impossible, but it’s difficult to imagine a bright enough future for Temple and Villanova to become as mainstream in the Philadelphia sports community to rival the popularity of Philly’s big four. Then again, bigger miracles have happened for sports teams in Philadelphia…
