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College Football Rivalries
By Eric | January 8, 2009
The 2008 college football season ends tonight (a battle of two Ohio boys), so here are some random design observations from two games I attended–arguably the two best rivalry games in the country.
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Ohio-State Michigan. Years ago there was a gray “O” at midfield, and I greatly preferred it. In fact, I think Ohio State should play up the “gray” angle because 1) no one else does and it would be proprietary, and 2) nobody does gray like the upper midwest in November–gray sky, gray stadium, gray everything.
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Ohio Stadium’s pressbox looms like a tower on an aircraft carrier; gotta love that “Battleship Gray” color. If you view Ohio State football and its many traditions through a military lens, it all starts to makes sense.
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North end of the Horseshoe showing the Ohio flag (the country’s best state flag design), the State Trooper standing below it (often interviewed by sportscasters during the game), and some Michigan fans (who are more visible when dressed in yellow than in blue).
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Ohio State: Scarlet and Gray, Pantone 200 and 429
Michigan: Maize and Blue, Pantone 286 blue and 123 yellow
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Problem! The yellow (“Maize”) in the flag is redder than the yellow in the pants. Based on the above spec, the flag (of course!) looks to be correct and the pants look to be wrong. The helmet yellow seems to split the difference.
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Sometimes the gray becomes silver. Two examples of this include the football helmet design (one of the best-looking in the country) and the horns in the all-brass military-style band (remember that the band predates the football team by ten years).
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Right to left: Me (in my flag cape, trying to use my flag collection more), my son, and Gary Hodges (Percussion Instructor for the Ohio State Marching Band; he did the same at my high school 25 years ago.) Trivia: For a noon game start, the OSU drumline reports at 5:00am.
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Script Ohio font size: about 86,400 points. (100′ from sideline to far hash; 1′ = 12″; 1″ = 72 points)
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Not to be outdone, this Block M font size is about 133,920 points. (155′ tall)
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Of course, I’d prefer gray endzones and leave all the scarlet to the players and fans. Best college football endzone design is probably Tennessee with the orange and white checkerboard.
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Way too many Ohio State logos! On the upper right corner is the old square academic logo, which I think is the beginning of the whole “THE Ohio State University” thing.
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Great truck cab graphic; nothing else is needed on the entire truck, really.
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Nice retro logo on the trailer.
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The rest of the trailer, not so nice.
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Army-Navy game in Philadelphia.
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Many thanks to my brother-in-law Tim Courlas, who secured tickets through a West Point friend.
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We arrived in time to see the Corps of Cadets assemble on the field. (We missed seeing the Brigade of Midshipmen assemble.)
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Note the faint Philadelphia Eagles logo visible behind this logo.
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Speaking of that, here’s the Philadelphia Eagles logo made out of upper-deck seats.
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Great branding: a flyover with helicopters.
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Corps of Cadets on the left, Brigade of Midshipmen on the right. On the field, the big news is the debut of Army’s new camo uniforms.
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Best logos are 1 and 9. (image from the Army website)
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This was the Army side of the stadium but there were a few Navy fans sprinkled in amongst us. The blue/gold hat in the foreground is Navy; the other two in back are Army. Some Army fan wear was the “bronze-ish” gold with black and some was bright gold and black.
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Army: Pantone 465 gold (metallic), Cool Gray 5, and black.
Navy: blue and gold (couldn’t find the specs, so here’s the Michigan colors again)
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President Bush doing the traditional walk from one side of the field to the other at halftime. The Long Gray Line, indeed.
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Looking north towards downtown and, in the foreground, the home of the World Series-winning Phillies.
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Post-game Philly cheesesteak, of course. Design note: authentic diner checks. Bonus roadtrip ending: Listening to the radio coverage (at 2:00am while driving home on snowy roads) of the UC Bearcats (my school) winning a thriller in Hawaii–the last game of the 2008 NCAA football regular season.
Topics: architecture, current events, family, logos, roadtrip, sports, typography | No Comments »