Big Three (colleges)

The Big Three is a historical term used in the United States to refer to Harvard, Yale, and Princeton. The phrase Big Three originated in the 1880s, when these three colleges dominated college football. High schools' college admissions counselors and colleges' admissions guides sometimes use the initialism HYP to refer to these colleges. In the early 1900s, these schools formed a sports compact that predates the Ivy League. The rivalry remains intense, though the three schools are no longer athletic powers, and schools continue to refer to their intercollegiate competitions as "Big Three" or "Harvard-Yale-Princeton" meets. The "Big Four" refers to the Big 3 and Pennsylvania.