Quellen | Most universities in America have varsity (short for "university") sports and intramular sports. The varsity sports are sponsored by the university compete against teams from other universities (famously, Harvard vs. Yale, or West Point against Annapolis). In football and basketball, they are often close to professional in quality, and they constitue big business for many universities. But varsity sports that do not have professional leagues (soccer, lacrosse, rugby) do not reach that level of popularity, though some less popular varsity sports produce a lot of Olympic athletes (swimming, fencing, rowing). (Female gymnasts are seldom old enough to go to college.)
Intramural sports, on the other hand, while often sponsored by the university, are usually played against other intramural teams from the same university, or sometimes against other intramural teams from nearby universities. These teams are typically based on dormitories, fraternities/sororities, clubs or departments. For example, at my college, every dorm had a soccer team. The computer science department and the math department both had frisbee teams. Lots of rivaly, mostly fun, but at a much lower level of skill than most of the varsity teams.
I dont' know of any German university that has a similar arragment. For specific sports you could refer to the fencing club or the university amateur soccer league, but there is no equivalent system as a whole. |
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