Black is Beautiful, if not Plentiful

You knew you weren't going to get anything resembling rational thought in an article entitled "25 more things we miss in sports," basically a chance of old-timer sportswriters to have a wank about what sports were like when they were 9 years old (No ads in stadiums, wood drivers, "the perceived innocence of college sports," etc.)

But this one took the cake

24. Non-black college uniforms
They were neat for a while, a break from the norm, a variation on the typically retro throwback. But now that nearly every NCAA program has trotted out a variation on all-black uniforms, school colors have become all but obsolete.

The purpose of uniforms is to identify a team or program -- heraldic devices of a sort. While most schools have historically employed a neutral color (black, white or gray) to serve as the signature shade for home games, a number of programs have lately taken to wearing all-black as their primary uniforms. Therein lies the problem: If everyone does it, everyone looks the same, negating the purpose of uniforms in the first place. Only a handful of athletic programs remain true to their roots -- Southern California and Penn State are two that come to mind -- and while they may not sport the prettiest pairing of hues, at least we can tell them apart. -- N.J


Well, just among the D-1 Football programs without black jerseys (let alone all-black jerseys), I also count...

1. Michigan
2. Michigan State
3. Ohio State
4. Illinois
5. Indiana
6. Wisconsin
7. Minnesota
8. Northwestern
9. Syracuse
10. West Virginia
11. South Florida
12. Pitt
13. UConn
14. North Carolina
15. North Carolina State
16. Georgia Tech
17. Clemson
18. Miami (FL)
19. Duke
20. Boston College
21. Virginia
22. Virginia Tech
23. Florida
24. Mississippi State
25. Kentucky
26. Tennessee
27. LSU
28. Ole Miss
29. Arkansas
30. Alabama
31. Auburn
32. Texas
33. Kansas
34. Kansas State
35. Texas A&M
36. Oklahoma
37. Oklahoma State
38. Nebraska
39. Baylor
40. Iowa State
41. Washington
42. Washington State
43. Arizona
44. Arizona State
45. Cal
46. UCLA
47. Stanford

of 65 BCS Conference teams.

So by my count, only 16 BCS Conference College football programs have black jerseys or black alternates (Iowa, Purdue, Cincinnati, Louisville, Rutgers, Florida State, Maryland, Wake Forest, Georgia, Vanderbilt, South Carolina, Texas Tech, Colorado, Missouri, Oregon, Oregon State).

Oh, don't forget Notre Dame and Navy. But why let facts get in the way of a good argument?