New Yorkers love all kinds of sports. Of course American football, baseball, and basketball attract most of the attention, as they do throughout the U.S., but soccer, ice hockey, and lacrosse are increasingly popular, especially among youths.
New York City is, naturally, the center of professional sports, and you'll find fans of the Big Apple's sports teams throughout the state?even though some of them actually play in New Jersey! Baseball's Yankees and Mets, basketball's Knicks, and hockey's Rangers all play in the city; the hockey Islanders play in nearby Nassau County. The Jets and Giants football teams and Red Bulls soccer team play just outside the city in north Jersey, as do the New Jersey Nets (basketball) and the New Jersey Devils (hockey).
Upstate, the sports business is smaller and more local. Buffalo has two major teams in the Buffalo Bills (football) and Buffalo Sabres (hockey); both have large followings as far east as Syracuse.
Baseball is the biggest pro sport upstate. Buffalo, Rochester, and Syracuse all have AAA clubs sporting near-big-league talent with minor-league prices. Binghamton has a AA club, while Auburn, Batavia, Fishkill, Jamestown, Oneonta, and Troy have singe-A short-season teams (as do Brooklyn and Staten Island in New York City).
Hockey is also big-time in the upstate cities. Rochester, Syracuse, Binghamton, Albany, and Glens Falls all have teams in the American Hockey League, the second level of professional hockey, while Elmira has an ECHL team. New York is also a hotbed for amateur hockey, and no state has more varsity college hockey teams than New York. Ten New York colleges and universities play Division I men's hockey, and eight play women's hockey; fourteen have D-III teams.
New York high schools are producing some outstanding lacrosse players, and that's reflected in the growing popularity of professional lacrosse. Rochester and Buffalo both have indoor teams in the National Lacrosse League, while Rochester and Hempstead (on Long Island) have outdoor teams in Major League Lacrosse; both leagues feature the sport's top professionals.
Soccer is very popular among the youth of New York, but professional soccer has struggled to make inroads. Rochester has a top-level women's team and a second-level men's team (and an indoor squad to boot), while New York City has a second-level men's team (top-level women's and men's teams play in New Jersey).
The Most Frequently Asked Travel Questions about New York (state)
Where To Stay & Best Hotels in New York (state) - updated Apr 2024
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New York (state) Travel Guide from Wikitravel. Many thanks to all Wikitravel contributors. Text is available under Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 3.0, images are available under various licenses, see each image for details.
