Why are Yale students called eli?

Answer 1

OK here is from someone from the inside for Yale the term Yalies is widely-used. The teams at Yale are called the Elis and or are also called the Bulldogs. Those who moved on referred to as Alums are sometimes called "Old Blues."

This doesn't just happen at Yale but also other universities for example Princeton people use Princetonian fairly frequently, mostly reserving Tigers for the sports teams. There's also a fondness for the school colors, reflected in a line from a fight song, "The Tiger stands defender of the Orange and the Black.. So Eli, Yalies, Bulldogs etc. are all part of the Yale culture.

Answer 2

What about people called Eli, can we expect them to be Yalers? Or do they really just have names like Elijah?