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Most of the time when it snowed in the late 1980s, Syracuse University alum Nancy Ring would head to the Sadler Dining Center and grab her makeshift sled: a dining hall tray. Then, she would run over to the hill outside of Crouse College.
“It was just like one big party, everybody would be screaming on the way down, and cheering for each other from the top of the hill, covered in snow and drenched,” Ring, who graduated in 1988, said.
When SU dining halls discontinued plastic trays in the early 2000s, some SU students have found that any object can double as a sled. But other than that, not much has changed. Since the first snow on Nov. 11, students have used whatever was at their disposal to sled down the snow-covered Crouse hill.
On Dec. 2, freshman Izabella Naloy found the perfect vehicle to act as her sled: the IKEA bags and storage container lids she used to move into her dorm in August.
“It was annoying to walk to class in the snow, but sledding makes up for it,” Naloy said. “It feels like whimsy college behavior, sledding down campus with your friends in the middle of winter is iconic.”
Although Naloy and her friends had finals to study for, their impromptu excursion became an hour-long study break. It felt like a “rite of passage” after hearing about the ritual on campus tours when she was a prospective student, Naloy said.
When touring SU, Naloy heard the Syracuse folklore about the first snowfall of the school year and the herd of students who congregate on top of the Crouse hill.
The Crouse College hill has been a popular sledding spot for Syracuse University students for decades. Facebook groups allow past SU alumni to look back at past sledding memories. Courtesy of SCRC
Sophomore Tess Feldman shares a similar spiel in the tours she gives to prospective students. In fact, most students learn of the Syracuse sledding tale before they even enroll at SU.
“You have to find those aspects that are interesting to us as humans in a community,” Feldman said. “It would be so easy for the student body to be like, ‘I’m just gonna stay in during the winter,’ but instead we choose to make a tradition out of it. We choose to make it something enjoyable.”
University 100 tour guides are encouraged to mention the tradition when their tour group approaches Crouse, Feldman said. Feldman, a U100 tour guide, typically gives one to two tours a week. In every tour, she said she makes sure to mention the sledding tradition.
While Feldman has yet to sled down the hill at Crouse herself, she said she has seen how the activity brings people with different majors and interests together, which she said is important to highlight in tours.
Feldman said one of the most frequent questions she receives from prospective families is about the safety of sledding down Crouse hill. While sledding down Crouse hill has made Syracuse winters tolerable for some students, it has also caused injuries.
SU sophomore Robbie Mosley knew he wanted to sled down the Crouse hill since he toured in high school. Mosley, who is from Texas, had never sled down a hill as steep or snowy as the ones on campus. Last December, during one of the year’s first snows, Mosley sled down the hill for the first time.
Despite not owning a sled, Mosley pushed his creative boundaries to find an object to slide down. He settled on borrowing an innovative sled from a friend: a fiberglass boogie board.
Trying to dodge his friends in a snowball fight at the top of Crouse, Mosley took the boogie board down the hill.
For many Syracuse University students, sledding down the Crouse College hill makes the harsh Syracuse cold tolerable. Sledding down Crouse College hill is a folklore many SU prospective students hear from tour guides. Tara Deluca | Staff Photographer
“Sledding was one of the things that I was super excited about going to school somewhere that it snowed,” Mosley said. “I ran up the hill and then just full send. I got in exactly the wrong line down the hill.”
His first sledding trip was short-lived. That trip down the hill left Mosley with several broken bones, a lacerated spleen and a week-and-a-half trip to Upstate University Hospital.
While Mosley has yet to return to sledding, he plans to participate in sledding even after the accident — but on a safer sled and less steep hill.
Senior and California native Addy Sprague had also never sledded before coming to campus. The hill on Crouse was the first place she decided to break that streak.
“It’s just been a really fun way to connect with the people and the community,” Sprague said. “When you are sledding here it is really fun, you meet lots of new people who are friendly and have camaraderie.”
But Sprague’s friend, SU senior Zoe Colman’s, college experience is still anchored by her yearly sledding tradition.
Colman’s freshman year roommate was from Australia and had never seen snow before. Colman said it was important to show her right away how fun the winter can be, despite the cold. So, she took her roommate sledding right after the first snowfall.
“It just makes winter better. Winter here can be hard, and sledding is something to look forward to,” Colman said.
Syracuse University students from 1979 climb up the steep Crouse College hill. Plastic trays from dining halls were used as sleds before its discontinuation. Courtesy of SCRC
Even after that first snow, Colman has kept that tradition alive. Since then, Colman said she typically sleds three times a winter in Syracuse.
While some SU students choose to brave the Syracuse cold with just a hoodie and a light jacket, Colman and Sprague bundled up in ski jackets and snow pants and used their friend’s sled during a big snow on Dec. 2.
“It’s so sentimental, I feel old,” Colman said. “I think about how I would go with my siblings and it’s the same but different experience being able to share my childhood by sledding with my friends my senior year.”
The memories of sledding down the Crouse hill don’t just end at graduation. For Ring, the Facebook groups and videos on social media around sledding down Crouse hill remind her of the joy she had while sledding at SU.
“A lot of traditions have fallen away. So to see that one tradition is still happening, I think ‘Oh, thank goodness something’s hanging in there,’” Ring said. “It brings me great joy, it reminds me of what I love about the place and of some of the best times I’ve ever had.”
Video by Taite Paradise | Staff Photographer, Eli Schwartz | Staff Photographer, Tara Deluca | Staff Photographer
Published on December 10, 2025 at 11:58 pm