Best Facemask and Helmet Designs in College Football
In college football, players come and go. So do coaches. But year after year, for the most part, helmets endure. Sure, some teams like to change them up and use “alternate” designs to connect with recruits or just be different (looking at you, Maryland and Oregon) but for many programs, helmets are an iconic piece of their uniforms that doesn’t change from season to season. USA Today's Alan Siegel gave his take on the 10 best helmets in college football.
College football has some incredible helmets and logos. New-school and old-school, busy and minimalist. Here are some of the best helmet and facemask designs in the college game. This is a subjective piece, of course, and surely you have your own opinion. But in one writer’s opinion, these are some of the most interesting, well-designed, iconic helmets in the college game.
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Facemasks
Let’s be honest. Most facemasks are the most anonymous part of a helmet. They’re the same color as the dominant color of the helmet, and they blend into the helmet. You don’t think about it. But more and more often, teams are taking chances with their facemasks, using multicolored schemes that stand out.
Two of the most unique adopters of this trend reside in the same state. Perhaps it’s no coincidence that Oregon and Oregon State use multicolored facemasks. Oregon’s blend right in with an often-wild helmet design, and the Beavers also pull off a multicolored look with a dual-color helmet, using orange and black interlocking into one another. Pretty sharp, really.
Helmets
Alabama
Alabama has one of the most tradition-rich programs in the college game. On a home-game Saturday afternoon, Bryant-Denny Stadium drips with tradition, from “Sweet Home Alabama” wafting over the loudspeakers to the hype video that precedes the Crimson Tide’s charge onto the stadium floor, showcasing the program’s history from Paul “Bear” Bryant to Nick Saban.
The Tide’s uniforms reflect that, as well. They’re simple and understated, and so are the helmets. Crimson with a white stripe down the middle and the player’s number on each side in white, they lack in major decoration, but they’re hard to forget. They showcase a program that knows its place in college football’s history and knows its tradition is worth savoring.
Clemson
Clemson knows tradition. If you’ve never been to a home game at Memorial Stadium, aka Death Valley, you’re missing out on what veteran announcer Brent Musburger calls the “Best 25 Seconds in College Football,” with Clemson gathering at the top of the hill above the east end zone to rub Howard’s Rock and come charging down the hill while 82,000 fans go absolutely crazy.
While many programs have experimented with new uniform combinations, Clemson and Dabo Swinney have largely resisted, save for purple tops and all-purple uniforms broken out on occasion. The helmet? That’s always, always the same. Clemson orange, with a purple and white accent stripe down the middle, and the classic, unchanged Tiger paw on the side, the same as the one painted at midfield. Under Swinney’s watch, Clemson has become one of college football’s best teams, but in reality, it’s just catching up with its helmet.
Georgia
Under Mark Richt, Georgia has established itself as one of college football’s most consistent programs. A Saturday at Sanford Stadium is a bucket-list item for any college football fan, with raucous fans cheering on the Red and Black, clad in the “silver britches.” Georgia has experimented with alternate uniforms over the year, but the Bulldogs’ best look involves their classic red-and-black helmets.
They’re instantly recognizable across college football, with a big black “G” framed in white with a red background and white accent stripe, and a white facemask. Georgia has yet to win a national title on Richt’s watch, but in the helmet game, the Bulldogs will always be a national contender.
LSU
There are a lot of unique things about Tiger Stadium, home of LSU football. The atmosphere. The fans. The food. The feeling that envelops the place for a huge night game. The H-style goalposts. LSU’s helmets? They reflect this.
With the yellow-gold background, the purple and white stripe accent and the Tiger logo underneath the LSU on each side of the helmet, you feel like you’re looking at a classic helmet when you see the Tigers take the field. It’s a history that runs from Billy Cannon to Leonard Fournette and plenty of stars in between, and the helmet is the perfect fit for such a tradition-rich program.
Miami
When you think of Miami football, what do you think of? “The U,” right? It’s an unforgettable look for Miami, which has been one of college football’s traditional powers since the days of Howard Schnellenberger in the early 1980s and the Hurricanes’ rise to prominence.
Miami fans across the nation throw up the “U” as an unforgettable hand signal, and it mimics the “U” found on the side of Miami helmets, with the left half orange and the right half green. While the helmets are best known with an all-white background, Miami has experimented with chrome, green and orange helmets in recent years. The “U,” however, has stayed the same throughout. And that’s the way it should be.
Michigan
As Michigan’s new football coach, Jim Harbaugh has some work ahead as he attempts to restore the Wolverines to their former glory, but one thing he won’t have to worry about? Michigan’s helmet design.
When Fritz Crisler arrived from Princeton in 1938, he designed the same helmet he’d used at Princeton. It’s a winged design that mixes blue and maize, and is one of the most enduring, classic lids in college football. It’d be hard to imagine Michigan wearing anything else.
Nebraska
Nebraska’s uniforms reflect its simple Midwestern tradition. The Cornhuskers are known as a meat-and-potatoes, hard-hitting program built on the run and strong defense, and a tradition of walk-ons fostered by legendary coach Tom Osborne.
While the Huskers have failed to find the success they had in the Osborne era, they haven’t changed their classic helmets: White, with a red stripe down the middle, a red facemask and a classic, big red "N" on each side of the helmet. Like Nebraska football, it’s a traditional design that still hasn’t gone out of style in the 21st century.
Notre Dame
There might be no place in college football where helmets are taken more seriously than Notre Dame. The Fighting Irish’s helmets contain flakes of 23.9-carat gold taken from the Notre Dame Administration Building, known as the Golden Dome. So week in, week out, players wear real gold on their helmets.
Until 2011, student managers actually repainted the helmets each week, a practice that ended when Notre Dame officials turned to a process that created a more consistent color of gold. Per the school's official site, athletic director Jack Swarbrick was frustrated with the color of gold on the helmets.
"We've got a color that looks a lot more like the dome," Swarbrick said in a YouTube video explaining the change. "Symbolically, the helmets have always been intended to reflect the dome, the most graphic symbol of this university. And quite frankly, we think we’re pretty darn close."
While the Irish have experimented with large green shamrocks and an interlocking ND on the side of the helmet in the “Shamrock Series” of neutral-site games, the classic all-gold helmet is one of the best in college football, and with good reason.
Tennessee
Before each home game, Tennessee has one of college football’s best entrances. Players and coaches run through the “Power T” formed by Tennessee’s Pride of the Southland Marching Band, all while a ravenous, packed Neyland Stadium crowd roars its approval.
The “Power T” also finds its home on the side of Tennessee’s helmets. The large, classic orange T stands out against a white background, along with an orange accent stripe running down the middle of the helmet with a white facemask. It’s an iconic helmet combination and while Tennessee has slipped from college football’s elite in recent years, its helmet certainly hasn’t.
Texas
Charlie Strong is trying to turn around Texas following the program’s downturn at the end of the Mack Brown era, and his first season at the Longhorns’ helm wasn’t exactly spectacular, with a 6-7 record and ugly Texas Bowl loss to Arkansas.
Rest assured, Strong will make changes in 2015, but Texas’ helmet won’t be among them. Simple and understated, with a white background, a white facemask and a burnt-orange Longhorn logo on each side, Texas’ helmets are immediately recognizable and something Strong shouldn’t mess with.
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