Phase 1 Completed!

The #1 Feeder School Comes from Queens!


I knew it would be a major undertaking when I decided to catalogue all the high schools that have sent players to Columbia football.

In fact, I quickly knew it would be a lifetime project that would never actually be "finished."

New names will surface from time to time.

Corrections and clarifications, especially for the players from long ago, will be a regular event.

And of course, new classes will always be announced every year.

But this week I finished a major chunk of the project by completing, to the best of my knowledge, the list of high school feeders corresponding to every Columbia varsity season from 1969-2009. Since I am now working a bit out of order, I also have the data complete from the varsity seasons of 1961 and 1962 as well.

All the schools and player names are on my newly-created Columbia Football Feeder site. Please check it out when you can, especially if you think you have some information I may have missed.

So what are the top 5 feeder schools to Columbia football in the period I've catalogued?


1. Stuyvesant HS (New York, NY) - 18 players


2. Saint Francis Prep (Fresh Meadows, NY) - 17 players


3. Deerfield Academy (Deerfield, MA) - 15 players


4T. Boston Latin School (Boston, MA) - 11 players

Brooklyn Tech HS (Brooklyn, NY) - 11 players

Cardinal Hayes HS (Bronx, NY) - 11 players


It's very telling that the current crop of Lions only includes ONE player from these historically top 5 schools, (that would be Carl Constant from St. Francis Prep).

A new trend favoring schools like St. Xavier in Cincinnati and Loyola HS in Los Angeles have me thinking we'll have more non-New York area schools in the top 5 within a few years.

But even with the focus on New York schools in the earlier years, it's amazing how geographically diverse this very long list of feeder schools is. Schools from all 50 states and several foreign countries are represented.

I don't envy the travel burden Columbia football recruiters face. But I am impressed with the work they've done and continue to do year in and year out.