POPE LEO PLAYS REFEREE AS VILLANOVA AND NOTRE DAME DESCEND ON THE VATICAN

Pope Leo received his old college basketball team and their rivals at the Vatican on Saturday, in a show of sportsmanship that went only so far, Reuters reported.

Leo, the first American pope, greeted the men's and women's teams from his alma mater Villanova, where he graduated in 1977, and from their rival Notre Dame, in the Vatican's Paul VI Audience Hall.

Roughly 7,000 players, guests and supporters attended the audience, a rare sporting occasion for a hall more used to heads of state, royalty and pilgrims.

The pope has received plenty of dignitaries since his election, but a college basketball rivalry — imported wholesale into the Vatican — is a different kind of diplomatic test.

Leo tried to stay neutral between the two schools, according to Reuters, though his Villanova roots were hardly a secret to anyone in the room.