Hail, Columbia.
That means the football program that once lost 44 games in a row but is now Ivy League champion. That also means the men’s basketball program that hasn’t had a winning season in eight years nor seen the NCAA Tournament since 1968 but is now 8-0.
Just what’s going on at New York City’s Ivy League school, where futility has splashed across generations? Something is up. Like, 1,454 feet up, at a certain midtown Manhattan landmark. “Obviously it’s an unbelievable accomplishment,” basketball coach Jim Engles was saying, “when you see the pictures of the Empire State Building in light blue.”
Columbia Lions light blue. It’s in. And this is why:
The football team outlasted Cornell 17-9 last weekend to finish 7-3 and clinch the school’s first conference title since 1961. True, the Lions must share it with Harvard and Dartmouth – meaning 37.5 percent of the Ivy League can say they’re co-champions – but who’s to quibble after six decades?
"To know that this actually happened after 63 years. I'll keep saying that, because that is all that kept being thrown at me," coach Jon Poppe said.
In those 62 years since, Columbia had only eight winning seasons – and six winless. They had 15 autumns with just one victory. From 1979-91 they played 128 games and won 10.
But now they’re third in the nation in scoring defense and when the other team can’t get into the end zone, good things can happen. Poppe’s seven wins are the most for a first-year Columbia coach since 1899, the year aspirin was introduced.
Admiring this feat has been Jim Engles, who coaches the basketball team so he has his full plate. “When you know all the hard work that goes into turning a program around and seeing the process actually come to fruition, it’s fun to see as a colleague and as a coach,” he said. Not that they share much air space, given Columbia’s unusually far-flung campus design. The footballers do their thing near 218th Street on the northern tip of Manhattan, where the Harlem River meets the Hudson. The basketballers are 100 blocks south, not far from Central Park. You need the A train to get from one revival to another.
About Engles’ team. Two days after the football title was in the bag, the basketball Lions rolled over New Hampshire 83-57 to go 8-0 for the first time since 1969. It’s a good start to what could be a first winning season since 2016 and 10th in 53 years. In the other 52 years, they had two campaigns with 20 wins, and 12 with 20 losses. Columbia recently received its first vote in the Associated Press poll since 1970.
The Lions were picked to finish fifth in the Ivy League, but the early returns have been more encouraging. They came from 12 points behind in the last seven minutes in their opener to beat Loyola Maryland 81-78, then fought through 19 lead changes to win at Villanova 90-80, outracing the Wildcats 27-9 in fast break points. It was the program’s first victory over a Big East opponent in 12 years. “That gives me a couple of days of practice that these guys are going to listen to me. That’s really all that comes from this,” Engles said that night.
They’ve been on an absolute tear since, leading at least 36 minutes in all six wins and trailing for only 2:58 out of 240 minutes. They have done it with a one-man fireworks show – Geronimo Rubio De La Rosa’s 37 points against Stony Brook and then 21 against LIU, the combined 73 percent shooting earning him Oscar Robertson National Player of the Week. But more often it’s been a wave of blue. They’ve had 67 field goals the past two victories and only 16 did not come with an assist. For the season, 66 percent of all baskets have been abetted by a helpful pass, which is one factor in the nice, crisp 49.5 percent team shooting.
Engles has been around a few blocks, taking a new Division I program at NJIT from 1-30 to 21-12 and 20-15 records last decade, and now in his eighth Columbia season. He understands a growth spurt in a program when he sees it. “The guys, there’s a connection now,” he said. “One of the things that makes me happy is I’ve got a lot of people now saying, hey, you guys are really fun to watch.
“It’s really been a selfless thing that is going on here. I’m just really proud to sit back and watch the way the guys are reacting in the locker room now, on the bus. It’s sort of why you do this stuff. I’m an old man now so I don’t get too high or too low with a lot of this stuff because I know it can go both ways.”
But so far no one can stop the four psychology majors and one Latin America and Iberian Cultures major, otherwise known as the Columbia starting lineup. Rubio De La Rosa is the Latin America major with a 22.8 scoring average, Next in scoring is Kenny Noland, who had a better-than-perfect 4.1 grade point in high school. So it goes in the Ivy League. The running back who led the football clincher with 165 rushing yards last weekend, Joey Giorgi, is an anthropology major.
The Lions returned nearly all their roster this season – rare in the modern vagabond world of college basketball – and Engles said that’s meant something. “It’s hard in our sport. It’s second to second, day to day, there’s so much negativity that comes with this,” Engles said. A bonding trip to Europe before last season led to obvious progress. When Columbia beat Temple in November of 2023 to go 3-2, it was the Lions’ first day above .500 since 2017. They finished 13-14 and then looked forward to more trending up.
All those other dark years apparently don’t matter now, in football or basketball. The past has taken a beating lately at Columbia.
“I try not to look at the past, I try to stay more in the moment,” Engles said. “I think the thing for us right now is not to look toward the future but stay in the moment and keep doing what we’re doing.”
Between NIL and the transfer portal and the fact the Ivy League is not allowed to play graduate students, it’s a challenge. It's trying to thrive old school. “Sort of that last bastion of what it was,” Engles said. “I don’t want to sound corny but the league is built on the academic reputations of our schools and there is an end game to academics in the Ivy League with the NIL. When you graduate from our place there’s a built-in NIL if you can look into the future that way.”
But that doesn’t make it easy when so many opponents are stocked with fifth and sixth-year players, some having honed their games in the Ivy League. “When they do leave, we know we’ve done what we can with them and we try to make sure they’re actually representing ourselves in some way when they do leave our program,” Engles said. “It’s the only thing you can really do.”
That’s what makes these good times so good. So what's next for the school whose enrollment has included Amelia Earhart, Barack Obama, Lou Gehrig, Sandy Koufax and Warren Buffett? Well, there’s March. The last time Columbia played in the NCAA Tournament the Lions beat St. Bonaventure – in the regional consolation game. They actually had those back in ’68.
“You’re getting way too far ahead of me right now,” Engles said of any NCAA thoughts. “One of the things we talk about is champions behave like champions before they become champions. If we continue to stay on the path that we’re on right now we can give ourselves a shot, that’s all we can really ask for.”
For more than half a century, that was asking a lot at Columbia. But right now, why not?
