Best College Football Uniforms: 10/28/21 – 10/30/21

Best College Football Uniforms: Week 9

Let me just say this: it was a very tough for me to narrow it down to eight teams for the best college football uniforms of the week. So far, no week has seen more than eight, but week 9 could have easily had 14 or 15 schools. With that being said, this is the best college football uniforms list for a reason, and that reason is that they are the best of the best. The teams from this list came out with a 4-4 record. Remember the Adidas and Nike beef I speculated on last week? Well, Nike answered the call this week, and we also saw a traditional school experiment with something new, blackouts, whiteouts, and another Uni Bowl. Read the best college football uniforms article from Week 8 here. Who made this list this week?

South Florida Bulls (1^st Appearance) & East Carolina Pirates (3^rd Appearance)

Uni Bowl #3 saw the ECU Pirates take down the USF Bulls 29-14 on a rainy Thursday night in Greenville, North Carolina. The Pirates have now made the best college football uniforms list three times, and this time they did it with a blackout uniform. I love their purple and yellow, but for a night game, it was really cool to see them bring out the all-black set. ECU used a matte black helmet with their skulls and crossbones logo. The jerseys had yellow numbers on the front and back, but white numbers on the tops of the shoulders to match the white lettering on the nameplates. There was also a yellow outlining around the sleeves, and that looked fine because on the pants, there were crossing bones and swords in yellow that repeated from top to bottom. One thing the ECU players needed to do better was figure out what color accessories to wear. Black should have been the color of choice, but I saw white and purple on some guys. If you’re going to do a blackout game, execute it properly. Still, I liked the set itself.

For USF, I’m surprised they haven’t cracked a list prior to this one. Maybe it’s my fault for not noticing their gold chrome logos and facemasks on their white helmets sooner. Those things are beautiful. Their pants were green and jerseys white. Nothing besides a gold Bulls logo on the front of the right hip was on the pants. For the jerseys, green numbers and letters outlined in gold gave them a nice shine under the lights (and the rain drops glistening off them). On both shoulders, they used a green background for a single gold horn – one that mimicked what you would see from the front if a real bull were charging at you. Unlike the Pirates, the Bulls were all on the same page with their accessories, and they chose white, which was by far the best choice for the night – though a wonder how gold might have looked.

Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets (1^st Appearance)

Georgia Tech played in a rainy game of their own on Saturday against Virginia Tech but lost 26-17. Usually, the Yellow Jackets would feature yellow as their primary color. Well, actually they use gold. But anyway, in week 9, they went with a two-color set that used navy blue as the primary color. I have to say, these are sharp. They stuck with their gold helmets but used a navy-blue facemask to contrast. There as no white on this set, unless you want to count the white “GT” logo on their helmets. I really enjoyed the matchup of fonts in this game. Virginia Tech uses a unique font that rounds everything off and must get its inspiration from circles, while Georgia Tech uses a very sharp and strict block font.

Liberty Flames (1^st Appearance)

Liberty finally got to take out its frustrations from being upset by ULM a couple weeks ago. The UMASS Minutemen were the unfortunate team that had to suffer the wrath of Malik Willis and the Flames, and they got stomped 62-17. Like Georgia Tech, Liberty donned navy blue from head-to-toe on Saturday. What completes Liberty’s uniforms is the striping on the shoulders and down the pant legs. The striping on those parts of the set have red sandwiched between white, but then on the numbers, the colors reverse. The white lettering is a nice touch, as well.

Oregon Ducks (3^rd Appearance)

Remember how last week Louisville implemented bird wings on the shoulders of there jerseys? Adidas shouldn’t have done that, because Nike and the Oregon Ducks just dunked on them with this uniform combination. Every year, the Ducks make yellow the primary color for at least one home game but doing it with black as the secondary is so clean. The shoulder wings returned, as well as the large numbers, helmet wings, and the “O” centered on the back of the helmet. It’s pretty much the same style as every other uniform combination Oregon throws out on the gridiron, but I just really, really love these colors.

Duke Blue Devils (1^st Appearance)

I think this could have been Uni Bowl #4, but because we already have two other blackout uniforms this week, I chose to exclusively highlight the whiteout uniforms that the Duke Blue Devils rocked against Wake Forest Saturday. They lost 45-7, but their simplistic all-white set made their royal blue numbers, letters, logos, and striping standout. They almost look like the Indianapolis Colts from the back, right? The helmet was the best feature, mainly because of the blue facemask. Of course, the famous Duke “D” looks fantastic, too. There was a time not too long ago when the Blue Devils weren’t half bad at football, but let’s face it, Duke is a basketball school.

Ohio State Buckeyes (1^st Appearance)

The Buckeyes traditionally stick to their scarlet tops and silver pants for home games, but for Saturday night’s big-time showdown between them and #20 Penn State saw the Buckeyes wear scarlet pants. In front of a sellout crowd, the all-red Ohio State Buckeyes took down the Nittany Lions 33-24, pushing them one step closer to the College Football Playoff. They kept their regular helmets, but those scarlet pants are such a great touch from Nike. The striping down the sides of them is the same as the striping on the shoulders. Ohio State players embraced the red look. Every glove, shoe, sock, and arm/leg sleeve were the same color as their jerseys and pants. Well done, Buckeyes. You win the crown this week.

Stanford Cardinal (1^st Appearance)

Stanford is another traditional team when it comes to uniforms, but they do like to wear an all-black set for a game each year. The fun thing with the Cardinal’s blackout set is that they don’t use white, rather crimson for their helmet logos, striping, and lettering on their backs. It would think: “how are you going to see crimson on a black background?” Well, Stanford uses a glossy texture for their crimson to stand out on the matte finish of their black helmets. The numbers on the front and back of their jerseys does have a thin white outline, however, but I think they should have done the same texture difference to help with that, and just rock a really menacing two-color dark set.

Which school do you think had the best college football uniforms from week 9?

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