Sunday Morning Uni Watch 2024: Week Eleven

Good morning everyone. What you see from a distance is a fairly pleasant (at least to me) color palette of black/white/red vs. white/brown/brown. This is from Wednesday night’s MACtion matchup between Northern Illinois and Western Michigan. Upon closer inspection, I wasn’t thrilled with the details, but I presented this photo for a different reason: you can add WMU to the list of teams that still have Gs on the goal lines. So the Broncos have the right thing for them. Which is nice.

While you won’t see this game in the top 5, you also won’t see a game with hard-to-read stars and stripes logos, camouflage logos, or reflective numbers, but you will see the best of the best and the worst…after you watch the rest of Sunday Morning Uni Watch have read. Now let’s get the ball rolling with our in-house ball roller, Terry Duroncelet. Take it away!

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I want Louisiana to stop being 482 million degrees in November, thanks.

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Thanks Terry!

Canadian University Uni Watch

The return is for 2024 Wade Heathwho wears a jersey designed by the one and only Wafflebored (who also took the photo). Now let’s enjoy Wade’s look at the three-down, 110-yard game from North.

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Yes, you know what time it is. Time for a Canadian Rules style college football jersey! It’s time for the CUUW!

Only eight schools were playing this weekend. The conference finals on the way to the Vanier Cup. Time to step up and win games. Collect trophies along the way.

Normally we won’t see anything unusual with the uniforms at this point in the season. One would expect teams to continue with the same combinations that won them playoff games this season. However, you will see that this will not necessarily be the case for all teams in 2024. The CUUW journey always runs from east to west.

Loney Bowl (Atlantic) in Lennoxville, QC.

*The winner of the Loney Bowl will be awarded the Jewett Trophy. The Bishop’s Gaiters did things differently compared to their home playoff win last weekend. The Gaiters wore their purple and lilac combination at home. I like them better in purple than in white. The Saint Mary’s Huskies wore white over white. The favored team won, but it went into triple overtime. (JV: Another Canadian walk-off FG!) This is the first AUS championship for Bishop’s since moving from the Quebec Conference in 2017. Bishop’s has previously won the Dunsmore Cup. Speaking of which…

Coupe Dunsmore (Quebec) in Quebec City.

*The Laval Rouge et Or also changed their home combination compared to their appearance in last weekend’s playoff win. The Rouge et Or chose their gold/red/red combination. The Montreal Carabins wore their blue/white/blue combination. A good looking game. The reigning Vanier Cup champion is eliminated. Laval takes the win and its 17th Dunsmore Cup.

Yates Cup (Ontario) in Waterloo.

*Lots of purple in the battle between two OUA football powerhouses at the 116th Yates Cup. The Laurier Golden Hawks opted for the same home combination as last weekend. Mono-purple from helmet to pants. The Western Mustangs opted for the combination of white and purple on the road. Laurier won its first Yates Cup since 2016. Note that both teams have a Yates Cup patch on their jerseys.

Hardy Cup (Canada West) in Saskatoon, SK.

*Lots of green here. Only the two Saskie schools remained, competing for the Canada West championship. Both teams won away playoff games last weekend to get here. The Saskatchewan Huskies wore their green-green combination at home. The Huskies will have to switch to a white mask next season. The Regina Rams stuck with the white-white road combination. A Cinderella underdog has won the 87th Hardy Cup after posting a 3-5 regular season record. The Regina Rams win their first Hardy Cup since 2000.

Sorry, eh! You’re probably thinking it’s crazy that we cover Canadian soccer and there were no snow games.

Next weekend will be fun because we get to see a lot between conferences. The four conference champions will advance to the national semifinals of the Mitchell Bowl and Uteck Bowl.

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Thanks, Wade…and be sure to give us some snow games next week!

2024 university tracking

Uni Watch will once again track the combinations worn in the Power Four college football conferences. Long term tracker Rex Henry (tracking the ACC) and Dennis Bolt (now on the Big Teen’s trail) return as they are Zach Wooldridge (Prosecution of the SEC). This year Derek Buchheit will track the big “XII” for us.

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We start with Rex and the ACC:

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More here.
Follow Rex on Twitter Here.

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Next comes Dennis with the B1G:

“Maryland goes for futurism, while Oregon goes for retrospection. Kind of ironic! Plus two mediocre flag helmet logos!”

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In addition to running the Big-10 Uniform Tracker blog, Dennis also runs the Oregon Duck Tracker blog. For a review of the Pac-12, check out the old Pac-12 Uniform Tracker blog. And he’s on Twitter/X at @BigDuckTracker

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Here’s Derek with the capital “XII”:

“BYU and Utah, who put on great color-versus-color play this week, are the only saving grace for the Big 12. What a stinker. WVU looked good too.”

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And here’s Zach from the SEC:

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Thanks, guys!

The 5&1 list

I’ll give you another five really good matchups and the worst looking matchup of the week. Unlike most lists, this is not an *exact* ranking. These are the five matchups that stood out to me the most, then I’ll rank them from 5 to 1. Agree or disagree, but either way, let’s have some fun with it.

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Yes, the BYU-Utah rivalry game last night looked very good…as long as you’re not colorblind. But for those who are, I’m keeping it out of top 5 consideration. I was already having a hard enough time summarizing the list, so this was another week where the details really mattered. Let’s see who made it, starting with…

5. The “Rothosen Alarm!” Game:

Jacksonville State vs. Louisiana Tech

A beautiful combination of red, white and blue to celebrate Veterans Day!

4. The “BFBS Uni I Really Like” Game:

Florida Atlantic vs. East Carolina

And I really REALLY like Owl University!

3. The “Color Palette Special” Matchup:

Virginia vs. Pitt

If it’s any consolation to fans of Pitt’s old rival, Penn State was my #6 matchup and their last game against Maryland *should* be a top-5 win.

2. The game “I love it when a temple looks like a temple”:

Temple vs. Tulane

The Green Wave almost rose from &1 to number one in consecutive weeks.

1. Simply the best:

Alabama vs. LSU

I think Phil forgot that this game was on the schedule when he suggested Iowa vs. UCLA(?) to me.

&1…Fresno State vs. Air Force

Not even Gs on the goal lines and snow on the sidelines could save another soulless chess game with hard-to-read numbers and illegible helmet letters.

Enjoy the rest of your Sunday

I’ve always said that the G in James G. Vilk stands for “G-Rated,” but I think I’ll say it stands for “Goal Line.” If you know of any other areas that still have the G, please let me know. I would like to create a list for as many schools as possible. I wonder if I could get the NFL to bring back the Gs…maybe if I told the commissioner they could stand for “Goodell”?

Anyway, have a relaxing Sunday and enjoy Phil’s midweek feast. Take care everyone, see you next weekend.