Collective nouns

[Victor Steinbok]

  I'll second that.

     VS-)

On 9/17/2010 4:28 PM, Laurence Horn wrote:
> At 3:49 PM -0400 9/17/10, Bill Palmer wrote:
>> The NC State Wolfpack football team just won their third game last night.
>>
>> A headline on the WRAL-TV website asserts:
>>
>> "Despite 3-0 start, Pack have work to do".
>>
>> This just sounds wrong, even if a similar usage might be OK in the
>> UK, as I believe one subscriber mentioned some time ago.
>>
> Not to me, although it might have 30 years ago.  But with e.g. "the
> Heat" and "the Jazz" joining the Celtics, Knicks, Lakers, etc. as
> team nicknames (in the NBA, but there are parallels in other
> leagues--"the Fire", "the Storm", "the Crew", "the Revolution",...),
> there are more chances for these collective plurals.  I think both
> forms are used:  "the (Miami) Heat have/has a good chance at the
> championship" are both quite natural, with a quick google search
> indicating a preference for the plural agreement.  "(the) Pack" is of
> course headlinese for "the Packers", which would obligatorily govern
> the plural, so that might make "the Pack have" rather than
> "has...work to do" even more likely.
>
> LH
>
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