Queen's Golden Gaels
The Queen's Gaels (also: Queen's Golden Gaels) are the athletic teams that represent Queen's University in Kingston, Ontario, Canada. Team colours are blue, red, and gold. Its main home is Richardson Memorial Stadium on West Campus.
Their rallying cry is the "Oil Thigh", a fight song sung in Gaelic by spectators when the home team scores a point, goal, touchdown, etc. Originally written in 1898 after a disappointing loss to the University of Toronto, the name comes from the phrase sung repeatedly in the main chorus: "Oilthigh na Banrighinn, a' Banrighinn gu brath", or "College of the Queen forever" in Gaelic. The song has the tune of the Battle Hymn of the Republic; its English verses about the rivals of Queen's College alternate with the Gaelic chorus.
Queen's teams have had a variety of successes on the national and international stages over the university's history. The Gaels football program is one of the oldest and most successful in Canada, boasting a total of three straight Grey Cup victories in the early twentieth century (1922, 1923, and 1924) and four Vanier Cup victories as the top team in Canadian Interuniversity Sport (1968, 1978, 1992, and 2009).
In the last two seasons alone, the Gaels have captured 11 provincial and national championships, including the 2009 Vanier Cup championship, the 2010-11 CIS Men's Curling Championship and the two time 2011 and 2012 CIS Women's Soccer Championships. Men's and Women's Volleyball won OUA Championships in 2012.
Read more about Queen's Golden Gaels: Name, Baseball, Basketball, Football, Ice Hockey, Track and Field
Famous quotes containing the words queen, golden and/or gaels:
“Most Gracious Queen, we thee implore
To go away and sin no more,
But if that effort be too great,
To go away at any rate.”
—Anonymous. “On Queen Caroline,” in Diary and Correspondence of Lord Colchester (1861)
“Nor envy’s snaky eye, finds harbour here,
Nor flatterers’ venomous insinuations,
Nor cunning humorists’ puddled opinions,
Nor courteous ruin of proffered usury,
Nor time prattled away, cradle of ignorance,
Nor causeless duty, nor comber of arrogance,
Nor trifling title of vanity dazzleth us,
Nor golden manacles stand for a paradise;”
—Sir Philip Sidney (1554–1586)
“For the great Gaels of Ireland
Are the men that God made mad,
For all their wars are merry
And all their songs are sad.”
—Gilbert Keith Chesterton (1874–1936)