These teams include men's and women's basketball, cross country, track, lacrosse, soccer, and swimming and diving.

In 2008, the men's baseball team won the regular season MAAC championship for the first time in its history with a 41–13 record.

Sitting at 2–7, The Griffs would win their final 2 regular season games to advance to the MAAC championship as the 3 seed.

From there Canisius would avenge regular season losses to Detroit 12–10 and Siena 10–9 en route to their 2nd MAAC Championship and automatic qualifier.

The college adopted it in 1932, after Charles A. Brady ('33) wrote a story in a Canisius publication honoring Buffalo's centennial year as a city.

Brady wrote about Rene-Robert LaSalle's Le Griffon, the first European ship to sail the upper Great Lakes, built here in Buffalo.

According to GoGriffs.com, the griffin is a "mythical creature of supposed gigantic size that has the head, forelegs and wings of an eagle and the hindquarters, tail and ears of a lion."

It represents values such as strength, vigilance, and intelligence, all of which befit a college and qualities that one would look for in students and athletes alike.

Around 1917, Buffalo manager, Barney Lepper, signed a lease for the team to play their home games at Canisius College.