Texas-Arlington Football

[sc49erfan15]

Since it's summer and I work an early morning job, I've had quite a few "nights in"...leading me to resurrecting this concept series, if out of nothing else but sheer boredom. If you're a veteran board member, you might remember these concepts. If you're new... here's the rundown. I've been designing football concepts for NCAA teams that don't have football since way back in October 2005 - no set schedule, no set order of teams, although I do tend to focus on NCAA D-1 and periodically get inspirations from the NCAA Tournament and College World Series.

For reference, here are the first 45 concepts in the series:

Winthrop, Vermont, Creighton, Marquette, Gonzaga, Charlotte, Seton Hall, Wichita State, George Mason, Bradley, UNC-Wilmington, Wisconsin-Milwaukee, South Alabama, Pacific, Xavier, Loyola Marymount, St. Joseph's, DePaul, St. John's, Pepperdine, Providence, Alaska-Anchorage, Portland, Charleston, UNC-Asheville, Drexel, Santa Clara, Old Dominion, Long Beach State, Denver, Cal State-Fullerton, UC-Irvine, New Orleans, Texas A&M-Corpus Christi, VCU, Saint Louis, San Francisco, George Washington, Belmont, UMBC, Illinois-Chicago, UNC-Greensboro, Lipscomb, Wisconsin-Green Bay, and IUPUI.

And onto #46, the Mavericks of Texas-Arlington:

-The University of Texas at Arlington is the third-largest university in the University of Texas system, after the main Austin campus and the University of Texas at San Antonio. The university boasts an enrollment of around 25,000 (~19,000 undergraduate) but is apparently a largely commuter campus, with only about 4,000 students living on campus. (IIRC, we have at least one UTAer here on the boards - vicfurth - maybe he could comment more on this if he sees it. )

-The Mavericks - whose nickname predates the Dallas Mavericks by 9 years - once had a football team, playing in the Southland Conference, of which Texas-Arlington was a charter member and still competes in other sports. The team was disbanded in 1985, citing losses (>$1 million per year) and attendance (5,600 per home game, when the enrollment was ~23,000) as the main concerns. Some past UTA helmets can be found here, here, and here at the Helmet Project.

-In 2004, the student body of UTA approved a tuition increase that would, in part, fund a football team - however, the increase was never applied and UTA is still sans-football.

-Onto the design, I played around with some ideas, and then it hit me that the "A/star" logo could be worked into the striping on the pants. However, this left the jerseys plain... so, I moved the logo halfway up the jersey and continued the stripes. I've never really seen a logo positioned here (please feel free to correct me) but I rather like it. I then added 1980s Bills-and-Jets-esque stripes that match the pants stripes to the arms.

-The helmet idea was somewhat simple as I only had two logos to work with, but I went with something similar to what UTA's club football team uses (seen here) but added orange trim. However, I wasn't about to take any ideas from their uniform design. I know they're a club team and probably have to pay for their own uniforms (as I once played club lacrosse for Winthrop and we were in the same boat) so I'm not going to knock them.

-And the throwback alternate - while doing my research and scanning old UTA football media guides, I found that the Mavericks actually put "Movin' Mavs" on the front of their jerseys in the early '80s - back when UTA's colors were navy and red, not royal and orange. Color me amused, and I felt that these rather unique togs had to be brought back in the form of an alternate. (Here's the picture I modeled them after.)

That's it - I hope you've enjoyed this crash-course on UTA and its football program, now let me know what you think of the concept!

[dakotapalm]

Since it's summer and I work an early morning job, I've had quite a few "nights in"...leading me to resurrecting this concept series, if out of nothing else but sheer boredom. If you're a veteran board member, you might remember these concepts. If you're new... here's the rundown. I've been designing football concepts for NCAA teams that don't have football since way back in October 2005 - no set schedule, no set order of teams, although I do tend to focus on NCAA D-1 and periodically get inspirations from the NCAA Tournament and College World Series.

For reference, here are the first 45 concepts in the series:

Winthrop, Vermont, Creighton, Marquette, Gonzaga, Charlotte, Seton Hall, Wichita State, George Mason, Bradley, UNC-Wilmington, Wisconsin-Milwaukee, South Alabama, Pacific, Xavier, Loyola Marymount, St. Joseph's, DePaul, St. John's, Pepperdine, Providence, Alaska-Anchorage, Portland, Charleston, UNC-Asheville, Drexel, Santa Clara, Old Dominion, Long Beach State, Denver, Cal State-Fullerton, UC-Irvine, New Orleans, Texas A&M-Corpus Christi, VCU, Saint Louis, San Francisco, George Washington, Belmont, UMBC, Illinois-Chicago, UNC-Greensboro, Lipscomb, Wisconsin-Green Bay, and IUPUI.

And onto #46, the Mavericks of Texas-Arlington:

-The University of Texas at Arlington is the third-largest university in the University of Texas system, after the main Austin campus and the University of Texas at San Antonio. The university boasts an enrollment of around 25,000 (~19,000 undergraduate) but is apparently a largely commuter campus, with only about 4,000 students living on campus. (IIRC, we have at least one UTAer here on the boards - vicfurth - maybe he could comment more on this if he sees it. )

-The Mavericks - whose nickname predates the Dallas Mavericks by 9 years - once had a football team, playing in the Southland Conference, of which Texas-Arlington was a charter member and still competes in other sports. The team was disbanded in 1985, citing losses (>$1 million per year) and attendance (5,600 per home game, when the enrollment was ~23,000) as the main concerns. Some past UTA helmets can be found here, here, and here at the Helmet Project.

-In 2004, the student body of UTA approved a tuition increase that would, in part, fund a football team - however, the increase was never applied and UTA is still sans-football.

-Onto the design, I played around with some ideas, and then it hit me that the "A/star" logo could be worked into the striping on the pants. However, this left the jerseys plain... so, I moved the logo halfway up the jersey and continued the stripes. I've never really seen a logo positioned here (please feel free to correct me) but I rather like it. I then added 1980s Bills-and-Jets-esque stripes that match the pants stripes to the arms.

-The helmet idea was somewhat simple as I only had two logos to work with, but I went with something similar to what UTA's club football team uses (seen here) but added orange trim. However, I wasn't about to take any ideas from their uniform design. I know they're a club team and probably have to pay for their own uniforms (as I once played club lacrosse for Winthrop and we were in the same boat) so I'm not going to knock them.

-And the throwback alternate - while doing my research and scanning old UTA football media guides, I found that the Mavericks actually put "Movin' Mavs" on the front of their jerseys in the early '80s - back when UTA's colors were navy and red, not royal and orange. Color me amused, and I felt that these rather unique togs had to be brought back in the form of an alternate. (Here's the picture I modeled them after.)

That's it - I hope you've enjoyed this crash-course on UTA and its football program, now let me know what you think of the concept!

I love this design. You've done a very nice job with this- a touch I think is good is the stripe coming from the "A" logo in the side of the jersey.

So... How about a USC Upstate uniform, since you are just up the road?

[sc49erfan15]

Bumping this from page 2 - I already have the next team done, but would like to get some more comments on this one first.

USC-Upstate is on my short list, I just have to hunt down some vectors. Thanks for the compliments, as well.

[logocruncher]

Pretty creative, but to my eyes it doesn't look so hot. I'm not a huge fan of side panels as it means one can't mix and match pants, and the basic look just isn't so great, but that's just me. The sleeve striping looks great, though, and that throwback alt is a beauty.

[Perfect Zero]

Well, I'll be going to UTA in the fall, and I can say that football is the one thing the college needs. There is no school spirit anywhere mainly because there is nothing to rally around. There's a reason it's known around here as Arlington Community College.

Off of my brief history lesson, I think this looks pretty good, except for the fact you have the "spirit" logo. I would much prefer the bronco logo that the team has (the mascot is Blaze, and it works really well with curvy designs). Also, the university is trying to distance itself from the flagship in Austin as much as possible, and the use of orange is rarely being used. Other than that, I think it looks pretty darn good.

[Canadian_Idiot]

Well, I'll be going to UTA in the fall, and I can say that football is the one thing the college needs. There is no school spirit anywhere mainly because there is nothing to rally around. There's a reason it's known around here as Arlington Community College.

Off of my brief history lesson, I think this looks pretty good, except for the fact you have the "spirit" logo. I would much prefer the bronco logo that the team has (the mascot is Blaze, and it works really well with curvy designs). Also, the university is trying to distance itself from the flagship in Austin as much as possible, and the use of orange is rarely being used. Other than that, I think it looks pretty darn good.

no offense.. but if the university truly was trying to "distance" itself from UT.. why did they change their colors just a few years ago?

The Red, White and Blue was perfect. Why the move to Royal and (nearly burnt) Orange?

(p.s.: i'm a DFW local, and brother of a UTA alumnus- so even if i'm going to UNT- i DO remember the R,W&B. )