The (Somewhat) Complete UConn Uniform History, Part III

The history of UConn uniforms continues! This segment takes us from the late 1960s through the end of the I-AA/FCS era. 

Part I is here, Part II is here.

1968: After years of wild designs, UConn simplifies its look with a rather plain jersey and pants. After decades of using navy blue as their primary color, the Huskies lighten it to something closer to navy blue. The helmet logo changes to a Chicago Bears-style "C" with stitches inside to simulate a football shape, a simple-but-clever logo.

1971: UConn becomes the first Yankee Conference team to wear names on the jerseys. The C-with-stitches logo moves from the helmet to the sleeves, making for a very bland helmet. Red is added as a trim color for the first time.

1973: The names are removed, while the helmet goes from white to light blue. The C-with-stitches logo returns to the helmet.

1977: The Huskies switch to a design that lasts well into the 1990s: A white helmet with a script "UConn" on each side  — the first time the school moniker appears on the helmets — and jerseys with three stripes on each sleeve. 

1982: There's nothing too different from the 1977 design, but check out the socks: There's a tiny "U C O N N" going down each side.

1984: Following a trend throughout I-AA/FCS football, the Huskies add names to the jerseys. By this time, blue facemasks appear on the helmets and the red trim disappears.

1989: UConn returns to navy blue, but the rest of the uniform remains virtually the same.  The "DEGENNARO" is for Matt Degennaro, a record-setting Husky QB of yore.

1994: Under a new coach (Skip Holtz), UConn makes its biggest overhaul since 1977. Navy blue helmets return with an italicized "UCONN" on each side. (A red outline is added in '95.) A husky logo appears on the sleeves and the pants, which come in both white and navy. UConn freely mixes and matches the shirt-pants combos over the next several seasons. Also note the Yankee Conference patch, first used in 1993 under the old design, and the disappearance of names on the back.

1998: In honor of the school's football centennial, a special patch is worn on the left sleeve. Also this season, the Huskies play their first postseason games in program history when they reach the I-AA playoffs. (During the season, UConn openly pondered a move up to I-A/FBS, so perhaps the '98 playoff run clinched the decision?) One year earlier, the Yankee Conference morphed into the Atlantic 10, and the league patch on the front reflects the move.

1999: In their final I-AA/FCS season, the Huskies change their look under new coach Randy Edsall. The taller "UConn" logo resembles the one used on the women's basketball jerseys, while drop-shadow numbers (oh-so-trendy in the late 90s) are added. Also note the alternate vertical striping on the shirts, much like what Boston College and the New England Patriots used around this time. The white pants are put on the bench for now.

Next time: The series concludes with the FBS era!

Boston University (What If?)

One of my favorite uniform sites is Steven Grant Design, which features a treasure trove of ice hockey concepts, plus blank templates for those who wish to make and submit their own jersey designs. (Someday, I should unleash my Hockey East concepts!) Grant recently did a series of "What If" concepts for defect NHL teams like the Minnesota North Stars had they stayed put, while capturing the NHL's (often hilarious) fashion trends over the last 30 years. What does this have to do with football? Well I naturally began thinking about applying Grant's concept to defunct college football programs, which leads to this post.

What follows is a fictional timeline of what Boston University's uniforms might have looked like had the school decided to spare the program in 1997. You can check out the final-year unis here. I hope to eventually add Vermont and Northeastern. 

2000: The Terriers do some minor changes, making the sleeve logo match the official one (the '97 version had a more homemade look) and adding a tiny "BOSTON" wordmark. Russell replaces Wilson as the uniform supplier.

2005: Nike replaces Wilson, but few changes are made other than the "BU" replacing the uniform number on the helmets. (If you so a search for BU basketball and hockey, you'll see BU's uniforms across the board are pretty conservative.) The Terriers also sport a 1950s throwback uniform in honor of legendary football and baseball star Harry Agganis, who died 50 years earlier.

(I just realized I've never done the Agganis-era uniform for this site. I'll have to change that eventually.)

2008: The piping craze overtakes college football by this point, and BU is no exception, although the Terriers try to keep it classy. (Penn had a similar pattern around this time.) By this time, the red pants are gone, and the CAA patch replaces that of its predecessor, the Atlantic 10.

2014: Piping becomes as passe as it was trendy just a few years earlier, and BU ditches the weird stripes in favor of contrasting sleeve panels, a la New Hampshire. The Terriers also join the trend of placing a logo on one side of the helmet and a uniform number on the other. And speaking of trends, BU unveils a special breast cancer awareness uniform, along with a pink-tinged helmet.

Also note the addition of the Patriot League logo; the real-life Terriers joined the PL in 2013, and it's a safe bet they would have joined in football, too.

2015: Nothing changes except for the addition on an all-black alternate. The reaction from fans and alumni is swift and severe, and the unis are worn for only game before they are discarded and sold off at a spring cleaning sale a few years later.

2019: By this time, Under Armour is making the Terriers' uniforms, as it does for their other sports in real life. The contrasting panels are replaced by shoulder stripes, which makes the unis resemble Cornell's from about a decade earlier. An alternate helmet has a slightly oversized Terrier head. and a 1969 throwback uniform honors the 150th anniversary of college football and the 50th anniversary of BU's Pasadena Bowl team.

2021: Most of the designs, including the popular throwback, are still around, but a new alternate uniform replicates the BU hockey design, right down to the pants and socks. Which goes to show that even if football had stayed on Commonwealth Avenue, hockey likely would remain the top dog.

Delaware Blue Hens (2000)

The latest pulls from the grab bag and the random number generator give us the 2000 Delaware Blue Hens, one of the better non-title teams in that program's esteemed history.

The Team: The Hens went 12-2 overall and 7-1 in Atlantic 10 play, sharing the league title with Richmond (which Delaware defeated 24-17, which leads to this thought: Since the Hens defeated the Spiders in the regular season, why did they have to share the league title? Why not use tiebreakers, a la the NFL?). Delaware outscored its foes 570-238, surpassing the 40-point mark eight times. The topper was an 84-0 nail-biter over West Chester, a poor D-II team that was shut out four other times that year. (The Golden Rams must have been hard up for cash to take that body bag game.) 

The Hens crushed Portland State and Lehigh in the I-AA playoffs before falling to Georgia Southern, 27-18 in the semis.

A 2000 (Wilmington) News Journal front page spreads the good news. 

The Players: Three Hens — Brian McKenna (LB), Jamin Elliott (WR) and Jeff Fiss (OL) — were named I-AA All-Americans and all A-10, and McKenna was named A-10 defensive players of the year. Matt Nagy (QB), Chris Phipps (OL) and Mike Cecere (DL) also made the all A-10 first team. Nagy remains the school's all-time leader in passing yardage (8,214) and passer rating (146.74; what, you thought that Flacco guy held all the records?).

The Coach: Tubby Raymond, of course, is an all-time legend, going 300-119-3 from 1966-2001. Some fun trivia about Tubby:

1) He was the head baseball coach at Maine from 1952-54 and Delaware from 1956-64, going 164-72-3.

2) He played two years of minor league baseball.

3) He loved to paint and created pictures of senior players every year.

4) His son Dave was the original Phillie Phanatic. These days, he's a motivational speaker.

The Uniforms: Like Raymond, Delaware's unis were a constant, having undergone minimal change since the 1950s save advances in helmet/jersey technology. After Raymond left, the Hens experimented with their look more, adding stripes and giving their blue and gold a noticeably lighter tone. You can see last seasons unis here for comparison.

The Fallout: Delaware fell to 4-6 in 2001 as Raymond struggled to earn his 300th win. But his successor, K.C. Keeler, took the Hens to the I-AA national title in 2003. Keeler also won a title at Sam Houston State (2020-21), making him the only coach to win FCS titles at different schools.

Northeastern Huskies (2002)

I hate to drag the phrase "fake news" here, but let's face it: Preseason polls are generally "fake news." They're mostly based on how teams did last season, with no regard to who's returning, who's left, etc. Maybe it's because I'm steaming that my Black Bears were picked to finish ninth in the CAA preseason poll. (If Maine finishes ninth or lower in 2021, I promise to do a post on the worst team in Maine history, and I think I know which one it is, by far.)

OK, rant over. Let's look at a team that was picked to finish next-to-last in its league in August, and celebrated a league title in November: The 2002 Northeastern Huskies, the only championship team in the program's 77-year history.

The Team: Picked to finish 10th out of 11 teams in the Atlantic 10 (formerly Yankee Conference, now CAA), Northeastern shocked the league by going 10-3 overall, 7-2 in league play to share the A-10 title with defending co-champ Maine (which was picked second in the preseason poll). The Huskies shut out their first two opponents, including a 31-0 shellacking of I-A (FBS) Ohio U. The two league losses were to Delaware and William & Mary. (Oddly, Northeastern and Maine didn't play each other in '02 despite their geographic closeness.) The season ended with a 29-24 loss to Fordham in the NCAA I-AA (FCS) tournament, only the second postseason game in Northeastern's history and the first since a 27-6 loss to East Carolina in the 1963 Eastern Bowl.

The 2003 Northeastern media guide showcases
many of the stars from the '02 season.

The Players: Running back Tim Gale set a single-season school record with 16 touchdowns and tied another with 96 points and was named first-team all A-10, as was OL John McDonald. In the air, quarterback Shawn Brady (isn't that a character on Days of Our Lives?) threw 16 touchdown passes. Linebacker Liam Ezekiel set a school record with 145 tackles and one of three Huskies named all A-10 on defense, along with DL Steve Anzalone and DB Art Smith. Kicker Miro Kesic (first-team all A-10), scored 85 points, fifth most in school history. 

The Coach: I wrote about Don Brown in this post several months back. These days, he's the defensive coordinator at the University of Arizona. (Triviata: Brown started his career in 1978 as an assistant as Hartford (Vt.) High School, a couple TD passes from where I used to live, and was later defensive coordinator at Dartmouth College.)

A 2002 Northeastern program.

The Uniforms: After wearing some pretty ugly unis in 2001, Northeastern went to a look more reminiscent of what it wore in the 90s, with all black at home and all white on the road. The rather busy helmet logo from '01 remained. (The Huskies switched to a simpler block "N" in '04.) 

The Fallout: The 2003 Huskies were picked to win the A-10 (see what I mean about predictions based upon the previous year's results?), and Street & Smith (remember them?) had Northeastern No. 1 in the nation. While the Huskies failed to meet those lofty forecasts, they still finished 8-4 and were ranked Nos. 20 and 19 in the final polls while missing the NCAA tourney. Northeastern never had another winning record before the program was shut down in 2009.

Northeastern Huskies (2001)

We're going to try something a little different. For the next few posts, I'll pull a school out of a hat, then use a random number generator to pick the year, and then write about that team and uniform. Let's see that we get ...

2001 Northeastern? Geez, one year later and I would have had a good team to write about. (The '02 Huskies won the only conference title in their history.)

Anyway, here goes...

The Team: The '01 Huskies went 5-6 overall, 4-5 in Atlantic 10 play for their fourth straight losing season.

A 2002 Northeastern schedule shows the '01 uniform.

The Players: Running back L.J. McKanas ran for a Husky-record 1,756 yards and 14 TDs. Of course, with Northeastern having since dropped football, McKanas will continue to hold those records for some time. McKanas and defensive back T.J. Hill were first-team all-conference. Other all-conference selections were OL Jim Bode (second team), DL Steve Anzalone (second team), DB Art Smith (second team) and LB Liam Ezekiel (third team).

The Coach: Don Brown was in his second year at Northeastern and went 27-20 (one of only three Husky coaches to compile a winning record) from 2000-03, when athletic director Ian McCaw left for UMass and took Brown with him, resulting in an ugly dispute (and the beginning of the end for the program). These days, he's the defensive coordinator at the University of Michigan. 

Northeastern's jerseys, c. 2001.
Not mine, sadly; the pix came from a dealer's site.

The Uniform: Frankly, this might be the ugliest uniform Northeastern ever wore. The helmet logo, featuring the full Huskies logo rather than a paw or a letter "N" as in other years, is too detailed for a helmet and is hard to make out from a distance. The red shirts and black pants just clash (the Huskies went to an all-black ensemble the next year) and the drop-shadow numbers are DOA -- dated on arrival. The "NORTHEASTERN" wordmark, sporting a double outline, is hard to read. Otherwise, not bad. 😎

The Aftermath: As noted earlier, the Huskies shared the A-10 title in '02 and finished No. 11 (Sports Network) and No. 10 (USA Today) in the polls. The '03 team failed the make the tourney, but still finished No. 20/19 in the rankings. Brown left for UMass after the '03 season and led the Minutemen to the 2006 NCAA FCS title game. The Huskies never had another winning record before the program folded after the '09 season. 

Maine Black Bears (2001)

It's not always easy being a Maine fan. Small budget, middle of nowhere, so-so sports teams while your chief rival (New Hampshire) sits on the sunny Seacoast, makes the football playoffs every year and kicks arse in almost every other sport it plays in (I mean, hoops and soccer now? Really?). It makes you wonder if you should be playing the other UNH (University of New Haven) instead.

I oversimplify, of course. Maine in the past has churned out nationally-renowned, history-making teams in hockey, women's hoops and baseball. Maine football is always very competitive, and occasionally, very good. And in 2001, the Black Bears were flat-out outstanding. 

Ninth-year coach Jack Cosgrove had slowly dug Maine out from revolting (a long string of 3-8 years) to respectability to reaching the top. The '01 Bears went 8-2 in the regular season (cut short to 10 games because of 9-11) and 7-2 in Atlantic 10 play to share the league title with Villanova, William & Mary and Hofstra (Hofstra?), and qualify for the NCAA I-AA (now FCS) playoffs for just  the third time in their history. Maine even beat UNH that year (57-24)!

Maine opened the playoffs at McNeese State in Lake Charles, La., where the Bears pulled off the 14-10 upset for the first postseason win in program history. A pair of third-quarter touchdowns -- a 27-yard strike from Jake Eaton to Chad Hayes and a 4-yard run by the late Royston English -- made the difference. 

The Bangor Daily News pages tell the story:
Maine wins its first playoff game in team history.
Note the honor stickers on the helmets, something
the Black Bears haven't done in years.

A week later, it was on to Northern Iowa, the school Kurt Warner made famous, and the UNI Dome. Although the teams were tied at 28 in third quarter, UNI scored four straight TDs to take a 56-28 win. Eaton, a member of the school's Hall of Fame, threw for 330 yards and three TDs in a losing cause. English, the workhorse running back who ran for 1,301 yards in the regular season and scored nine touchdowns, was out with an injured right foot.

All told, however, it was an amazing season, as Maine tied a school record for wins (9, broken just one year later), and finished 10th in The Sports Network I-AA poll, Three players -- tight end Hayes, linebacker and future San Diego Charger Stephen Cooper and safety Lennard Byrd -- were named All-Americans by various groups. Cooper was the A-10's defensive player of the year and Cosgrove was coach of the year. The achievements go on.

It may not be easy, but 2001 proved that Maine football can turn some heads, win a playoff game ... and yes, even defeat UNH. 

UMaine Hall of Fame quarterback Jake Eaton
and the 2001 home uniform, with drop-shadow numbers. 

Another shot of the home uniform, with receiver Stefan Gomes.
Note the  HY-OOGE Atlantic 10 patch; the football version of the league was a successor to
the old Yankee Conference and a predecessor to the current CAA.

Oh, you wanted to read about the uniforms? Yeah, I guess that's this blog is about. Maine was in its second year of a monochrome look with a script "Maine" on the helmet. What was new was the home jersey, with the oh-so-trendy drop-shadow numbers that aged about as well as Nickelback. The road shirts, in their final year, were first worn in 1997. The all-blue look at home has continued to this day -- a nice bit of consistency in a college football world where uniforms are dominated by anything but.

Can't bear to be without Black Bear uniforms? Here are some more: 2016, 2015, 2014, 2011-13, 1997-99, 1985, 1976-84, 1975, 1974, 1965, more 1965, 1963-64, 1957-59, 1949-50, 1939-46, 1928-29. Rivalry week: Maine-New Hampshire. Inside the jersey: 2010-13.

Yale Bulldogs (1972-73); New Hampshire Wildcats (1993); Northeastern Huskies (1997)

Our last post, on Cornell's 100 years of football patch, had me thinking of other teams that celebrated their school's or program's centennial with a patch or decal.

Celebrating your team's 100th birthday is one thing ...
but your 101st? Check out the helmet on the Yale player
in this 1973 Yale Daily News pic.

The early 1970s Yale Bulldogs took perhaps took the most unorthodox method. The sons of old Eli simply took the famous "100" decal teams used in 1969 to celebrate college football's centennial and slapped it in front of the trademark "Y" on the side of the helmet. (Yale used the "100" decal on the helmet front in '69). Whether to be different -- or perhaps they were just too lazy to peel the decals off -- the Bulldogs replaced the "100" with a "101" in '73.

The UNH centennial logo, taken from an image in the 1994 Granite yearbook.

New Hampshire's decal celebrated the school's centennial with a patch using the trademark image of Thompson Hall that used to be part of the school's non-athletics logo (until it was replaced by the current "NH" seal, which set off a debate more intense than internet uniform arguments) and was frequently featured on the cover of the school yearbook, The Granite.

Northeastern's patch celebrated the school's 100th anniversary. The football team made it to only 76 years before it died in 2009. The patch was also used on the hockey jerseys during the 1997-98 season.

This was also the first year Northeastern went back to black jerseys after three seasons in red. In true Northeastern fashion, the Huskies went back to red in '99. That said, the "paw-on-shoulder" jerseys are among my favorite from the pooches.

A couple other centennials already have been observed here: Penn (1976) and Delaware (1989).

Yale uniforms: 2015, 2014, 2013, 2006-11, 1997-98, 1994, 1996, 1979-82, 1978, 1974-77, 1967-68, 1965, 1959-60, 1954-58, 1930. Rivalry Week: Harvard-Yale.

UNH uniforms: 2015, 2014, 2010-13, 1998, 1975, 1968-71 (part 1),  1969-71 (part 2), 1966-67, 1950, 1947-48, 1938, 1936. Rivalry Week: Maine-UNH.

Northeastern uniforms: 2008-09, 1994-96, 1989-90, 1982-86, 1976-77, 1973-75, 1963-68, 1936, 1935.

Rhode Island Rams (2003-07)

Busy, busy, busy would be the words to best describe Rhode Island's mid-Aughties uniform. A double outline on the numbers, a funky pattern for collar and sleeve trim, and logo AND a word mark below the collar, manufacturer AND league logos on the front, side panels ... I think I see the Dead Sea Scrolls in there somewhere. This might be the busiest jersey in our little project. At least Rhody didn't mess with the rams' horns.

Thankfully, the Rams' subsequent uniforms have kept it pretty simple. 

Two AP photos of Rhody in action in 2007. I prefer the all-white combo.

There are more uniforms out there from Rhody: 2015, 2014, 2013, 1997-99, 1983-92, 1976-82, 1967-71, 1966, 1963-65, 1962, 1957-61, 1936-39. Rivalry Week: UConn-Rhody.

Delaware Blue Hens (1997-2003)

Sometimes, it's the team that makes a uniform special. Occasionally, it's the uniform that makes a team special. With Delaware, it's the best of both worlds, like pulled pork and nachos.

Delaware's 1997-2003 uniform isn't too different than anything else the Blue Hens wore before 2004, but there were a couple big highlights during the time period:

1) In 2001, Delaware coach Tubby Raymond collected his 300th (and final, a la Lefty Grove) victory as head coach;

2) In '03, the Hens won their first NCAA I-AA (FCS) national title -- and sixth overall when you add the boatload of Division II titles from the 70s.

In '04, Delaware went to curved numbers after a switch in manufacturers (to Nike from Wilson), and the era of a classic uniform that launched in 1951 came to a partial close (after all, the winged helmet remains to this day).

The Delaware Blue Hens celebrate Tubby Raymond's 300th coaching win
in 2001. Am I the only one who thinks Tubby looks like Lee Corso?

Other notes about the late-90s/early-aughties Hens' uni:

1) The Wilson manufacturers' logo on the jersey kept changing/moving, which made for some consistent inconsistency;
2) A black band was worn above the A-10 logo on the 2001 home jersey after the 9/11 attacks.

Delaware QB Andy Hall faces off against The Citadel (must remember to capitalize the "the") in 2003
on his way to the I-AA/FCS title. He was a Georgia Tech transfer and married a Tech cheerleader.
Remind me to be a quarterback in my next life.

There's more from the Delaware hen house: 2011-14, 2004-06, 1989-92, 1980-88, 1975-79; 1973-74, 1972, 1967-71.