Tuesday’s Washington Post has this story about the impact that the success of George Mason’s basketball team has had on campus, and off.
An institution that was once derided as a commuter school has rallied behind its basketball team in the past week, and students predicted this season, which continues with a game against Wichita State on Friday night, will leave a permanent mark on their school’s reputation.
“It’s like we actually go to a real school now,” freshman Alex Innes said. “That’s what everybody’s saying.”
For those of you outside of Northern Virginia, you’ve got to understand…..George Mason University is, in large respect, still a commuter school. Many of its students live in and around the Fairfax, Virginia area where the main campus is located. Its law school is located 15 miles away in Arlington.
Academically, Mason is without doubt a superior university — home to two Nobel Laureates in Economics, as well as the one-and-only Walter E. Williams, and boasting a law school that has included minds such as Robert Bork and Court of Appeals Judges Douglas Ginsburg and Raymond Randolph.
In the athletic field, though, its been a different story. GMU does not have a footballt time. Before this season, it probably wasn’t taken seriously in the NCAA. That certainly isn’t the case after knocking off the defending champions.
Good for them.
I attended GMU Law School in the early 90s and we were, quite literally, cut off from the main campus, so I can’t say that my school loyalty has run all that deep over the years. All the same, I’ll be rooting for the green and gold as they go up against those boys from Witchita State on Friday.
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