RICHMOND, Va. — Each year Virginia Tech and the University of Virginia football teams compete for the Commonwealth Cup and bragging rights around the state. Recently, the competition has not been close. Virginia Tech has a 13-1 record over UVa. since the year 2000. That might be part of the reason why Virginia Tech dominates Virginia when it comes to college football Facebook likes.
The New York Times put out an interactive map that breaks down college football fandom, based on Facebook likes, by zip code. In Virginia, it is not even close. As you can see below, most of Virginia is covered in Virginia Tech maroon, with the exception of Charlottesville which is strongly Cavalier blue.
“Like the other sets of maps, these were created using estimates of team support based on each team’s share of Facebook ‘likes’ in a ZIP code,” the Times wrote. “We then applied an algorithm to deal with statistical noise and fill in gaps where data was missing. Facebook ‘likes’ are an imperfect measure, but as we’ve noted before, Facebook likes show broadly similar patterns to polls.”
Of course, Virginia and Virginia Tech first faced off in football in 1895, so the recent success of the Hokies over the Wahoos can’t be the only factor in Tech’s Facebook dominance. Click here to tell us why you think it appears most of Virginia supports Virginia Tech over UVa.
Virginia will look to end its football losing streak when the Cavaliers travel to Blacksburg November 28, the Friday after Thanksgiving.
