Ohio State's primary colors are scarlet and gray. It's perhaps the most unique primary color combination in D1 college athletics, very few schools feature gray as a primary color and only school to my knowledge to feature it with scarlet.
I'm among those of you who think Ohio State football (and basketball) do not properly feature one of it's primary colors: gray.
Most of it's branding, uniforms, graphics, logo, and field designs, have been missing the mark over the past decade or so, becoming too enamored with white and black to compliment scarlet. As such Ohio State uniforms and graphics are no different than Rutgers, Louisville, Georgia, or the many generic red, black, and white schools.
We got a sneak peak of the Rose Bowl field design the other day and I found it disappointing in that the sidelines are scarlet rather than gray as the field is in the Ohio Stadium (I'm glad this was incorporated into the new field a few years ago). Then factor in that the Ohio State endzone text is made to match the field design in Ohio Stadium the only gray present is the thin font outline while the letters are white.
I don't understand why the letters have any white at all, they should be entirely gray like this:
I became curious to explore the history of Ohio State bowl game endzone designs since they tend to vary from bowl to bowl and can also be more creative at times. I went back to 1980 with the help of YouTube.
There are some really great ones in here, some duds, and a clear era beginning in 2007 when gray was completely abandoned.
1980 Fiesta Bowl
This one is solid, no messing around, just the two primary colors with a simple font that’s somewhat blocky but with rounded corners. 8/10
1984 Fiesta Bowl
This appears to be nearly identical as the game and photo above although the font appears to be a bit bolder which seems to suit Ohio State’s brand.
Score: 8/10
1985 Rose Bowl
This one is pretty amazing. Huge, bold, O H I O font in gray surrounded by scarlet. Extreme simplicity and interesting font. Has a California ‘70s vibe. But ultimately it’s not a good font for the word ‘Ohio.’ The ‘O’s’ look weird surrounded by ‘hi’ in the middle (yes, I know the song).
Score: 6/10
1990 Hall of Fame Bowl
Interesting scheme here with a serif maybe Roman-style font with scarlet letters and a gray outline within a white field. Too much white in the end which washes out the gray.
Score: 5/10
1992 Hall of Fame Bowl
Exact same design as 1990. Here we can see that beyond the typical thick white boundary line there is a double scarlet and gray line.
Score: 5/10
1997 Rose Bowl
The pinnacle of the Cooper era. I absolutely love the full-tilt use of gray here! As with the 1985 Rose it’s an odd font for the word ‘Ohio.’ The blockier fonts work better both for the word ‘Ohio’ and to suit the Ohio State brand.
Score: 6/10
1999 Sugar Bowl
Font is similar to those of the 1980’s Fiesta Bowls, blocky but rounded corners, works well with the words and brand. Scarlet letters with a nice thick gray outline. This is almost as good as possible short of painting the entire endzone.
Score: 8/10
2003 Fiesta Bowl
Incredible game, of course. Pretty good endzone design as well. The font type matches exactly what was used in Ohio Stadium at the time, the difference here being that the gray words are set within a field of scarlet. The thick boundary lines are gray which is a nice contrast complement. Ultimately I don’t like this font type for Ohio State for the same reasons listed above in addition to not digging the offset thin outline.
Score: 5/10
2004 Fiesta Bowl
Exactly the same as used in the 2003 game. Same comments and score apply.
2004 Alamo Bowl
They barely made any effort here at all. They did discover a block font which I like. Definitely got my wish for highlighting gray here! Leaving out scarlet entirely is pretty wild. This fails because you simply cannot leave out one of the two primary colors.
Score: 1/10
2006 Fiesta Bowl
Exactly the same as used in the 2003 game. Same comments and score apply.
2007 Fiesta Bowl
Exactly the same as used in the 2003 game. Same comments and score apply. Terrible game.
2009 Fiesta Bowl
And here is where the Rutgers era begins. Coincides exactly with Ohio State getting the artificial turf in the Horseshoe which looked like it was design by the sales rep in Word with Arial font. It was staggeringly bad.
Score: 1/10
2008 Sugar Bowl
Curiously doesn’t appear to be the same font used in the 1999 game, looks like Arial. Only saving grace here is that the Sugar did maintain its thick gray font outline.
Score: 4/10
2010 Rose Bowl
Travesty of travesties to copy/paste that terrible design from Ohio Stadium from that era into the beautiful setting of the Rose Bowl. They could’ve just spelled out ‘Rutgers’ because nothing about it speaks to Ohio State football.
Score: 1/10
2011 Sugar Bowl
Exactly the same as used in the 2008 game. Same comments and score apply.
2015 Sugar Bowl
Classic game. Exactly the same as used in the 2008 game. Same comments and score apply.
2015 National Title Game
Great game. Horrendous field design. Yes, the CFP design standard was to do a black field but that’s no excuse for using a white rather than gray outline around the text.
Score: 1/10
2016 Fiesta Bowl
Sigh, another terrible one.
Score: 1/10
2022 Rose Bowl
We’re beginning to pull ourselves out of the basement here due to the thick boundary line being gray. Still terrible Arial font, white letter with black outline. (Also, look at Utah’s font type here, it’s beautiful, powerful, that’s a font Ohio State could be using and would speak to the brand!)
Score: 3/10
2022 Peach Bowl
Continuing to improve, here with the new block font that I think Ohio State basketball first began using. But no gray in sight, just scarlet and white.
Score: 2/10
2023 Cotton Bowl
It’s not hard to make a monumental leap forward, just pair scarlet and gray together. Well done.
Score: 9/10
Lol… I hope you all enjoyed this. Look forward to reading the comments.
