Summit League Logo Battle: IUPUI

When it comes to The Summit League, we have some of the best nicknames in all of college sports. And what better way to embrace our team monikers than to take a look at their visual equivalences: the team logo. For all of our analyses, we used the primary logos for each team listed on the venerable website SportsLogos.net. (Please note that any digs thrown at the schools are just for fun and do not necessarily represent our true feelings about them!)

Program: IUPUI

Nickname: Jaguars

Origin of Nickname: Jaguars replaced original nickname of "Metros" when the university made the jump to Division I in late 90s. Chosen to reflect the spirit of Indianapolis and IUPUI: powerful, swift, and confident. (h/t: The Summit League)

Philosophical Take: The placement of IUPUI beneath the word Jaguar and in a much smaller font size is indicative of the university's desire to keep its name as hidden as possible. Due to years of torment and one too many "ooeepooee" jokes, the program instead chooses to embrace its animal spirit. The Jaguar here is menacing and its fangs sharp, paralleling the basketball program's tendency to consistently compete well against even the fiercest of opponents. Yet unlike most contemporary logos, the Jaguar's face is turned to the left as opposed to the right or forward-looking; this was likely done in an attempt to conceal the many facial lacerations the Jaguar has faced over the years from its demanding parents, the Hoosier and Boilermaker.

Final Judgment: The Jaguar is an animal already represented well by an NFL football team, yet IUPUI's version is original enough to avoid confusion. Unfortunately, the overwhelming use of black, gray, and teal (which is odd considering the NFL's team use of it) does come off as slightly misguided given the program's crimson and old gold uniforms. Moreover, the typography used for "Jaguars" is fairly amateurish, bringing to mind a rough sketch more than sophisticated graphic design.

How We'd Fix It: Instead of glorifying all things jaguar, we'd seek to embrace the city of Indianapolis. While its skyline may not be immediately recognizable to most, people from the state of Indiana - those most likely to care about IUPUI - surely know its main features. Because of this, we'd make the skyline a central figure in IUPUI's logo (think the Seattle Supersonics of old), establishing the Jaguars as THE program in Indianapolis. Moreover, we'd scrap the sketch-drawn Jaguars font for the Jaguars script of the early 2000s. Only the actual school colors are used, and the name of the school pops more. Finally, because the current Jaguar hides its face and contains too many colors, we'd go with the old Jaguar for now - it's still fierce, and with it peering through the shadows of the skyline, this feline is still poised to strike unsuspectingly. IUPUI, Indianapolis is yours.

(Beginner) Artist's Rendering: