Heritage Classic Announced
Wednesday · Aug 4 · 2010 | 4:26 PM PDT
Canadiens and Flames unveil retro Heritage Classic jerseys
This afternoon, the NHL officially revealed the details of the 2011 Heritage Classic at McMahon Stadium in Calgary, including the new logos and jerseys.
The Calgary Flames will host the Montreal Canadiens on Feb. 20, 2011 in the NHL's sixth-ever regular season outdoor game on the campus of the University of Calgary, home of McMahon Stadium.
The Heritage Classic logo features a prominent red maple leaf, the ultimate symbol of Canada, emblazoned with vintage style text and a stylized skyline of the city of Calgary. What more could you ask for in a logo?
The previous Heritage Classic, held in 2003, saw the Edmonton Oilers hosting the Canadiens at Commonwealth Stadium in sub-zero temperatures. It's expected to be between 22 and 30 degrees for the 2011 game in Calgary.
The Flames' Heritage Classic uniform pays tribute to Calgary's history
The Calgary Flames unveiled the specially designed uniform they will don at the Heritage Classic. It pays tribute to the Calgary Tigers, the first major professional team in the city. It existed from 1920 to 1927 and was the first team in Calgary to compete for the Stanley Cup.
A description was released on the Flames' website:
The uniform is a deeper red color with gold stripes and will include the 2011 Heritage Classic logo patch on the front. The Flames will also wear a beige hockey pant to complete this traditional look.
The Flames worked with the design team at Reebok to create the vintage look. The jersey features the same jersey striping pattern [as the Tigers'] with a beige Flames C logo in a vintage felt application.
The beige pants and canvas-colored gloves add to the vintage feel of the uniform.
The Canadiens also previewed their Heritage Classic sweater
The Montreal Canadiens, on the other hand, aren't looking quite so far into the past for their Heritage Classic threads. They "will sport the same jersey worn for home games between 1974-75 and 1995-96," according to the club's website. The only difference will be the patch on the front.
So what do you think of the 2011 Heritage Classic? Excited to see an all-Canadian outdoor game again? Thrilled/disappointed by the sweater designs? Sound off in the comments.
Reader Comments (66)
I love the Flames' heritage unforms, minus the pants and gloves. In fact, the Flames should go back to their 80s/early 90s look full-time and wear the heritage unis, with a few updates, as a third. OUT with the black.
As for the Habs, they should go back to their 75/96 uniforms full-time. The red is lighter and the lack of white space between the blue numerals and the red border looks a lot better. Their V-neck should be the blue-white-blue look. The 1990s was a bad era for all these uniform/logo changes and tinkering.
You know, every time I take a long hard look at the drawn image, I think to myself,
"Aaaaaah... well... I guess it coooould work out.. somehow..."
And then I scroll back up to the picture of Stamkos and realize, "Oh.. now thats just awful."
Canadiens-way to waste an oppertunity to use a more interesting jersey than the current away one. Would have been more interesting to see a completely white jersey with just the logo. Flames- Either use the original logo (like detroit did two years back), or choose a more recent one. (1980s, Atlanta Flames, etc.).
Hey don't forget that McMahon Stadium is home of the Calgary Stampeders of the CFL and is the principle tennant not just the University of Calgary.
The more I look at these flames jerseys the more it grows on me. I wasn't a fan of them at first.
Oh man, I totally wish Mike Commodore was still a Flame, then the Ronald McDonald look a like would truly be in full force.
After looking it over some more, I've come to the conclusion that the Flames shirt wouldn't be too bad if they did a couple of things.
For one, move the sleeve numbers up into the wider red space. The wide-arching top yellow stripe would look far less awkward if there actually was something in that red space, and the numbers look kinda low on the yellow stripe anyway... to me, at least.
Personally, I wouldn't use the canvas-beige color on the jersey at all. If they're going for an aged look, it offends me, as I wouldn't go out onto the ice in a truly aged sweater; if they're just matching the pants, then that's wrong too, as teams just didn't incorporate the beige/tan color of their unadorned canvas pants into their sweaters, and in fact dumped the plain pants for colored ones just as soon as it was technologically and economically feasible. Oh, and a red stripe on pants that are supposed to emulate the old canvas style? That's just wrong! Either go all-canvas, or use colored pants.
Those Flames jerseys are brutal. They look like something that Ronald McDonald would wear. If they were trying to emulate the Tigers they failed. The Tigers wore black and orange uniforms not red and gold.
The Canadiens are pretty lame too. They look just like thier current road uniforms. Why not wear the old white sweater with the blue belly stripe?
Bleh!
Who in the hell is that wearing Saku Koivu's number 11 for Montreal? Blasphemy!
Uh, kyojikasshu , teams back then added stripes to canvas pants on a pretty regular basis. It's hardly some sort of crime against nature. They could have dyed them, they didn't. I'm sorry if that defeats your preconceptions.
Evidence
Clarkson university pants from the 1920s. With stripe. It was common as hell, even for teams that had much smaller budgets then pro teams like the tigers.
Okay, I'll concede on the stripe matter, and admit my ignorance in that case.
I still think the sleeve numbers should be moved up to the wider red band. It would make a world of difference....
Wow, the Flames completely ripped off Gryffindor's colour scheme from Harry Potter. Apparently Ken King has watched too much Quiddich.
God, the Habs are so boring.
I know that the Canadiens are steeped in tradition and everything, but can't they be a little more creative? That jersey is just so...so...boring. Perhaps they should wear one of the uniforms that they wore for their 100-year anniversary, some of those were pretty nice.
I love these jerseys, and plan to buy one. I almost wish these became permanent 3rd's and the 80's jerseys were home and away.
Nice to see the Flames going with a unique design. I'm a bit disappointed with the Canadiens' jersey, though. Not really distinguishable from their current jersey, and not very outstanding on its own.
When you wear a jersey thats supposed to be the Calgary Tigers, you don't put a stupid flame on it, you keep the logo that is supposed to be on the jersey. I like the jersey, but I don't like how teams are tweaking jerseys for the winter and heritage classics. For example, the penguins winter classic jersey is supposed to have the same uniform as the powder blue ones that they wore in there first winter classic, just with the logo tweak. Instead, they took a jersey from the 90's that had a rangers style "Pittsburgh" across it, put the old logo on it, and swapped the striping colors with the jersey base color. Not cool. Not only that, but that penguins logo wasn't worn in the same era as the caps jersey was. Thats not too bad, but now these idiots from Calgary are putting there stupid flame logo on a jersey that is supposed to have a tiger on it. And although the colors are great, the colors on the uniform are supposed to be black and yellow, not red and gold. So basically all the flames took of that uniform was the striping. They can't even say that they copied them; its just not right. I'm not even going to start on the Habs; there lack of creativity hurts my brain, and you guys are tired of me rambling on. The NHL seriously needs a history lesson. They just messed with four elements of history in two jerseys.