You have mentioned state outlines on courts before on the blog. Do you know if there is a list anywhere or do you know many off the top of your head?
Here's what I have:
Current: UNC, Indiana, Mizzou, Texas, Texas A&M, Michigan State
Former: Tennessee, Kansas
The earlier entry on state shapes and outlines was posted roughly a year ago and is available here. It features a photo of Tennessee's old court design. Kevin was also kind enough to provide a link to Kansas's old court with the shape of the state (click here and then see Comments).
Missouri's court (shown below in a screenshot I made from YouTube) seems to barely qualify, as the relatively faint state outline is overwhelmed by the Tiger logo.
I don't know if Michigan State should be included, as its state shape is not used as the main center-circle design, but rather in a complementary fashion.
To the list of schools that formerly featured a state shape at midcourt, we can add Ohio State (St. John's Arena) and Oregon. Also, I think Kentucky's pre-Rupp Arena court may have featured a state shape, but I can't find any photos right now.
Thanks for the new post! I did some photo research for the Kentucky center court design. I found two versions of the team photo from 1977-78. The first one shows more of the foreground and what appears to be the outline of the state of Kentucky at mid-court:
ReplyDeletehttp://publish.netitor.com/photos/schools/kty//sports/m-baskbl/media-guides/champs1978.jpg
The second one has the foreground cropped, so it's more up-close on the team. But this allows you to see the side of the mid-court logo that is behind the players better and it appears to be the rest of the state of Kentucky, positioned as though we are looking at it from the East:
http://bigbluehistory.net/bb/Graphics/Teams/1977-78.jpg
Thanks for the Kentucky team pictures. The brick wall in the background tells us that the pictures were taken in a practice gym. However, a practice-gym floor design will often duplicate the actual arena floor.
ReplyDeleteMizzou state outline used to not be obscured: http://www.johnnyroadtrip.com/cities/stlouis/images/hearnescenter.jpg
ReplyDeleteI guess they figured they had to go BIG with their center court logo (like Kansas, Texas, Texas AM, and Kansas State) but wanted to keep the state outline too.