Indianapolis Greyhounds football

The Indianapolis Greyhounds are the college football team that represents the University of Indianapolis (UIndy). The team plays its home games at Key Stadium in Indianapolis, Indiana. Indianapolis is a member of the Great Lakes Valley Conference in NCAA Division II.

The university was known as Indiana Central from its founding in 1902 until the adoption of its current name in 1986. The Greyhound nickname for athletic teams dates from 1926.^[2] The original school colors, cardinal and grey, predated the athletic program, and eventually gave way to crimson and grey. The current "flying I" helmet logo dates from 2007, and has since been adopted as the general UIndy athletics logo. In 2011 Greyhound football adopted black (rather than crimson) as the primary dark jersey color, and most other UIndy teams soon followed suit. Black helmets followed in 2024, replacing the silver helmet that had been traditional since 1961.

Indiana Central's varsity sports records date from 1922, with the hiring of the first full-time coach and athletic director. The college joined the Indiana Intercollegiate Conference in 1923,^[3] and fielded its first football team in 1924. After a few successful seasons, the Great Depression nearly caused the college to close. Following a winless 1931 campaign with just 15 players, Indiana Central dropped football and did not resume the sport until 1946, amid the post-World War II boom in college enrollments.

In 1947, the Greyhounds became charter members of the Hoosier College Conference,^[4] and subsequently joined the National Association for Intercollegiate Athletics (NAIA). They remained in the Hoosier conference until 1970, winning championships in 1947, 1953, 1954, 1955, and 1960, but never qualified for playoffs under the NAIA (which did not hold its first postseason football game until 1956). Dick Nyers, star halfback on the 1953–55 teams, went on to play for the Baltimore Colts in 1956 and 1957. The 1953 team was the best Greyhound squad of the era, finishing an undefeated 8–0, including a non-conference victory at Ferris State.

In 1970–71 Indiana Central joined the Indiana Collegiate Conference (ICC),^[5] applied for membership in the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA), and began to offer athletic scholarships (which had not been allowed in the Hoosier conference). Three years later, the NCAA reorganized into its present three divisions (I, II, and III). Members initially were allowed to compete in different divisions in different sports, and were given five years to meet the qualifications of their primary division. Indiana Central chose Division II as its primary division but initially Greyhound football qualified for Division III, and made the D-III playoffs in 1975 (the program's only postseason appearance until 2012). In 1978 the ICC gave way to the Heartland Collegiate Conference (HCC), which did not sponsor basketball and, ultimately, became a football-only league. The Great Lakes Valley Conference (GLVC), founded the same year, became the primary conference for Greyhound athletics, while football competed in the HCC. The Greyhounds won HCC championships in 1978 and 1981, but failed to qualify for the Division II playoffs in either season.

By 1990, the HCC had dwindled to five members, who joined six schools from the Great Lakes Intercollegiate Athletic Conference (GLIAC) to form the Midwest Intercollegiate Football Conference (MIFC).^[6] Indianapolis remained an MIFC member through 1998, when the GLIAC resumed sponsorship of football and absorbed the MIFC. The Greyhounds then became a football-only associate member of the GLIAC, where the program remained through the 2011 season. Indianapolis posted 10 winning records in 22 seasons of MIFC-GLIAC play, including an 8–2 mark in 1998, good enough for a second-place finish, but never qualified for the postseason. The 2011 Greyhounds pulled off the rare trifecta of beating Grand Valley State, Ferris State, and Saginaw Valley State in the same season, en route to a 7–4 finish.

Indianapolis began playing football in the GLVC in 2012, when the conference (in its 35th year of competition) finally had enough football-playing members to sponsor the sport.^[7] In twelve seasons of GLVC play, the Greyhounds have won nine conference championships. They have qualified for the Division II playoffs eight times, scoring postseason victories over Lone Star Conference (LSC) champion Midwestern State in 2012 and Mid-America Intercollegiate Athletics Association (MIAA) champion Fort Hays State in 2018. An undefeated 11–0 regular season in 2017 included a season-opening victory over Grand Valley State. Loren Strickland, star defensive back on the 2019–21 teams, became the first former Greyhound since Dick Nyers in 1957 to play in a regular season NFL game, debuting with the Detroit Lions in 2024 after playing two seasons as a graduate student at Ball State.

From 1924 to 1988, every Greyhound football schedule included Franklin College, located twenty miles south of the Indianapolis campus. The Greyhounds only beat the Grizzlies once in their first ten meetings and never led the series, but went 5–0–1 in the last six contests to narrow the final margin to 23–26–2. The rivalry ended with Franklin's transition to Division III and non-scholarship athletics in the late 1980s.^[8]

By then, Butler had replaced Franklin as Indianapolis' primary rival. The Greyhounds and Bulldogs first met in 1930, then again in 1948 and 1954, but did not begin playing annually until 1969. After the Bulldogs won 10 of the first 11 meetings, the crosstown rivalry became quite heated, with neither team winning more than two consecutive games during the years 1977–93. From 1971 through 1992, the winner received the Top Dog Trophy. The rivalry ended with Butler's transition to non-scholarship FCS football in the Pioneer Football League, at which time the Greyhounds trailed in the series 7–19–2.^[9]

By the mid-1990s the Pumas of St. Joseph's College were the only other Division II football program in Indiana and became the main football rival of the Greyhounds. The two teams first played in 1971 and met annually through 2007 (except for 1998), then again as members of the GLVC from 2012 through 2016. When St. Joseph's closed at the end of the 2016–17 academic year, Indianapolis led the series 30–10–1, on the strength of 17 consecutive victories from 1995 onward.^[10]

Among opponents currently on the Indianapolis schedule, the longest-standing rivalry is with Hillsdale. The Greyhounds first played the Chargers in 1978, and the two programs have met 36 times in the last 47 seasons. Initially Hillsdale dominated the rivalry, but Indianapolis has turned the tables by winning nine of the last ten meetings, and currently leads the series 20–16.^[11]

The Greyhounds made one appearance in the NCAA Division III playoffs, with a record of 0–1.

The Greyhounds have made eight appearances in the NCAA Division II playoffs, with a combined record of 2–8.

The Greyhounds have had 15 head football coaches. Bill Bless holds the program records for most seasons coached (22) and most wins (114).

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