Surprisingly, they’ve never actually touched the thing.

After spending all of last year battling for the Tyng Cup, the greatest honor in all of Yale IMs, Timothy Dwight intramural secretaries Ivan Soares, TD ’11, and William Hwang, TD ’10, confess that they have never held the cup. This is not to say that they didn’t fight for it. Soares, the Head IM sec for this year, and Hwang, a new secretary this year but a long time IM player, were part of the core group of students that helped carry TD to the top of the standings.

It wasn’t an easy road though. Over the course of the year, the program faced heavy resistance from their rival, Silliman. Their cross-Temple rivals had held the cup for three years, and had their eye on the first four-peat since the legendary 1981-1985 Timothy Dwight era. In addition, after a dominant winter season, the Spiders of JE made a surprise run for the Tyng, losing to TD by a razor-thin margin of 24.5 points. The two secretaries also experienced their own hard losses. Soares had to endure a volleyball loss in the playoffs after an undefeated regular season, and Hwang had his heart broken in a tie against JE in Ultimate Frisbee, which barred his team from the spring playoff.

How did they do it? Both credit the high college spirit in TD, which helped to establish a strong lead at the end of the fall season. TD spirit permeates the college, and it’s taught from day one—beginning with the Freshman Dinner. At this year’s banquet, Hwang gave a rousing speech to the members of the class of 2013. As Hwang was recalling the legends of TD IMs, he was interrupted by a heckler. Just as it seemed as if all was lost, TD’s upperclassmen stormed the dining hall, cheering the TD motto and helping Hwang to defeat the “intruder.”

The strong fall season almost turned out to be a hindrance for TD. “Once we came out of the fall with a big lead, people got kind of comfortable. It was difficult keeping attendance up at first,” said Soares. This all changed once JE started to make a run for first place. “The psychological threat of JE’s rise really got us going again,” said Hwang. With the help of a new threat to TD’s dominance, the Lions were able to fight

their way out front and battle with JE throughout the winter and spring seasons. Soares, Hwang, and the other members of Timothy Dwight were also able to keep forfeits to a minimum, and Soares said, “I could count the number of forfeits for the year on one hand.”

In the duel for the Tyng, minor games seem incredibly important. “When you’re trying to hold onto first place, your emotions are amplified by the rankings,” Hwang said. “Wins and losses are multiplied in magnitude.”After months of fierce games and the emotional roller coaster of heavy competition, it all ended with a spike. During the last regular season game of spring volleyball, Soares slammed down a bad pass by JE, keeping them out of the playoffs and sealing the Tyng for TD. Still, there were several weeks left before the final standings would be announced, so Soares was reluctant to accept his peers’ premature celebration.

Then came the day of the official announcement from the Yale Intramural Program, which named TD as the champion, forever putting the Lions in the history books of IMs. As Soares remembered, “It was just a sigh of relief, really. There was an outpouring of excitement from the college, everyone was hugging everyone—it was just such a great experience, to think that we had managed to win the whole thing. The seniors were so happy, since they had been trying for three years to wrest it away from Silliman.” Master T was elated, throwing a lavish party for the members of the college, complete with people dressed as lions, a drum ensemble, and scantily clad Brazilian dancers.

So, looking back, what do these two secretaries think made the difference? For Hwang, it was the culture of TD. With Master T as the figurehead, the IM secretaries are able to institutionalize IMs, filling everyone with a hunger for the Tyng Cup. Soares believes that victory came from the balance that TD showed across the board. Whatever it was, it worked. TD brought everybody out, and at the end of the year, they brought home the hardware.