Team: Kansas Jayhawks
Stadium: Memorial Stadium
Conference: Big 12
Sport: College Football
Background: The University of Kansas
(sometimes referred to as KU) is an institution of higher
learning located in Lawrence, Kansas. The University
was founded in 1864. It had a fall 2003 enrollment of
29,272. The University's School of Medicine is located
at Kansas City, Kansas. The KU Edwards Campus is located
in Overland Park http://edwardscampus.ku.edu. There
are also campuses in Parsons, Topeka and Wichita. KU
is home to the Robert J. Dole Institute of Politics
and to Kansas Public Radio. Radio station KANU was one
of the first public radio stations in the nation. The
university is host to several notable museums including
the Kansas Natural History Museum, the KU Museum of
Anthropology, and the Spencer Museum of Art.
Academics:
The University is a large state sponsored university.
In addition to a large liberal arts college, it has
schools of Education, Medicine, Pharmacy, Fine Arts,
Business, Journalism, Engineering, Architecture and
Urban Design, Social Welfare and Law.
Notable Faculty:
James Gunn Hugo award winning science fiction
author and creative writing professor.
Computing:
KU's academic computing department was an active
participant in setting up the internet and is the developer
of the seminal LYNX text based web browser. Lynx itself
provided hypertext browsing and navigation prior to
Tim Berners Lee's invention of HTTP and HTML. See [[1]
(
http://www.ku.edu/~grobe/early-lynx.html)].
Athletics:
The school's sports teams wearing crimson and blue are
called the Jayhawks. They participate in the NCAA's
Division I-A, and in the Big XII Conference. In NCAA
DI play, the Jayhawks participate in basketball, baseball,
cross country, football, golf, rowing, soccer (women
only), softball, swimming (women only), tennis (women
only), track, and volleyball (women only).
Football:
KU Football dates from 1890. While not a national powerhouse
like KU's basketball team, the Jayhawk football team
has had notable alumni including Gale Sayers, a two
time all-American. KU has played in the Orange Bowl
twice 1948 and 1968.
Basketball:
The men's basketball team is a perennial national
contender, even though their last national championship
was in 1988. In addition, Allen Fieldhouse is considered
one of the greatest places to play basketball in the
nation. Kansas has counted among its coaches Dr. James
Naismith (the inventor of basketball), Basketball Hall
of Fame inductee Phog Allen (sometimes dubbed "Father
of Basketball Coaching"), and Detroit Pistons coach
Larry Brown. Ironically, Naismith is the only Kansas
coach to have a losing record for his tenure in Lawrence.
The Jayhawks have won 4 national championships. The
1922 and 1923 championships were retroactively awarded
by the Helms Foundation in 1936. The 1952 and 1988 championships
were won in the NCAA tournament. They have the third
most all-time wins in NCAA history, behind Kentucky
and North Carolina. The coaches most responsible for
Kentucky and North Carolina being ahead of Kansas in
wins are Adolph Rupp and Dean Smith, the two coaches
with the most wins in NCAA history. They were both players
for Kansas under Phog Allen.