I suppose the only appropriate way to close the book on the reveal of Penn State hockey's new look is to offer an opinion. There's just one problem - in a way, I already have. Once again, here are the jerseys:
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Hannah Lane/Onward State
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Now look at this set of concept jerseys I posted back on August 10th:
The two alternates are obviously throwbacks to the 1940s varsity teams - and yeah, I still want to see those at some point - but the regular home and away? Pretty similar, I'd say. Just so I don't lose my jersey geek card, the differences are that the concepts:
- don't have a tie-down.
- do have a name on the away jersey and don't have the little Nittany Lion logo under the back collar on the name-free actual away jersey.
- have a slightly different font for the numbers - compare and contrast the 2s on (real) Max Gardiner and (concept) George Saad.
This may come off as overly picky (and it probably is), but if I had to offer a couple of criticisms...
- There's a reason I didn't include a tie-down in the concepts: I'm just not a huge fan of them unless used on a vintage-style jersey intended to look and feel like something from back in the day. Otherwise, they come off a little bit like an attempt at forcing something that isn't there.
- Although the Icers put surnames on the home jerseys but not the away jerseys for the last several years, the decision to keep that tradition (I guess it's a tradition) going is a little curious. I don't know that I categorically disagree with doing so, but I wouldn't mind hearing the rationale behind it.
- The tiny chipmunk on the back collar of the away jerseys is a nice touch, but why repeat the logo from the front of the jersey? I'd place a block "S" or even a "Penn State" wordmark there instead.
- I wouldn't have minded seeing some difference between the men's and women's jerseys. Even keeping the striping pattern consistent and going with the logo on the front of one and a block "Penn State" on the front of the other would have helped the teams keep their own identity to some degree without violating the "One Team"/synergy ideal. It admittedly is a little bit odd not seeing some form of "PSU"/"PS" or "Penn State" on the jersey for the first time in Penn State hockey history.
Maybe the best thing about Tuesday is that the outstanding new design finally and officially buries the previous Icers jerseys after 13 years. Despite being part of the longest-running uniform set in team history, and despite my support of the student-athletes who wore them and the team and school they represented, they were most certainly not my flavor. They were garish (by PSU standards, anyway), dated (the general design was used by several Nike schools in the early aughts before being dropped by everyone but the Icers), and perhaps worst of all, contained grey, which is not a Penn State color. So here's one more picture for the road, before I make every attempt to use photos involving the new threads whenever possible.
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| Goodbye. Adieu. Auf Wiedersehen. Gesundheit. Farewell. |
