Welcome back to The Rival Rundown! If you’ve always wanted to give props to your school on CC, now’s your chance! Shoot us an email explaining what’s awesome and unique about your school (or what stinks about Rival U) at rivalrundown@collegecandy.com!

Let’s travel to the Midwest, where the people are friendly, the food is hearty, and the state school rivalries are relentlessly combative. In the great state of Indiana, two state school systems (Indiana University and Purdue University) are so entrenched in a battle for loyalty that many homes boast signs in their windows reading “A House Divided”–or in other words, the domain has both Purdue and IU alumni.  Can one school win the rights to true Hoosier pride?

1. Mascot Match-up

Indiana – The Hoosiers are not only the university mascot but the state nickname–a term for someone who transports bales of cotton.  Though a derogatory word in other parts of the country, a Hoosier is a label of pride in Indiana!
Purdue – The Boilermakers get their moniker from the longstanding tradition of excellence in engineering at Purdue, which in the 1890s (at the time of the mascot’s inception) meant toiling in the forge room to boil and meld metal.

Three credits to: Indiana, since it takes some balls to claim a questionable slang term for a school (and state) nickname! Read More »