Gladiators Add 10th Anniversary Jersey

Photo from Gwinnett Gladiators official website

The ECHL's Gwinnett Gladiators will be sporting a special edition 10th anniversary sweater this season and fans can get their hands on one for the first time tonight when the club opens its home schedule.

The Gladiators are looking to their NHL affiliate, the Phoenix Coyotes, for inspiration, quite clearly. It's essentially the Coyotes' home sweater with some text on the front. That's right, text. My favorite. (Sorry, hope I didn't drip any of that sarcasm on you.)

It sounds like this won't be an alternate jersey so much as the Glads' go-to dark jersey this season. ECHL teams wear white and home and colors on the road until the midpoint of the season when they all do a big switch-a-roo. (It gives teams a chance to showcase both of their uniforms to fans in an effort to sell more of each.)

Here's what else the team had to say about it a couple weeks ago.

In honor of their 10th year in Gwinnett, the Gladiators have decided to commemorate the anniversary by introducing a new maroon jersey for the 2012-2013 season. Fans in attendance at this past Sunday’s pre-season game were privy to a special sneak peek at the new sweaters.

The Gladiators will wear them for Opening Weekend before their designation on road games as the "dark" sweater option per ECHL mandate. At the midway point of the season, member teams will switch their jerseys, and the Gladiators will finish the 2nd half of the year wearing their maroon sweaters at home.

In homage to the history of hockey, the jerseys have a decidedly vintage feel complete with lace-up neck and "Gwinnett" across the chest.

The right shoulder will bear the ECHL's 25th anniversary patch while the left will have the team's 10th anniversary patch. But whatever floats their boat, I suppose.

I have to say, the design is quite plain and really does nothing for me, but I'd rather hear what Gladiators fans think of it. Would you buy one? It turns out they'll actually be kind of a "limited edition" type deal since the team's contract with SP Apparel is ending and they don't want to be left with stuff they can't sell. (Does this also mean we'll see more new Gladiators jerseys in 2013?)

San Francisco Gets the Horns

Photo from San Francisco Bulls official website

The San Francisco Bulls made their ECHL debut over the weekend, giving us our first opportunity to see the team in action. And if you were paying attention when the club unveiled its uniforms last March, you'll notice a few differences.

Photos from San Francisco Bulls (Facebook)

Mainly, the name and numbers on the back of the jerseys have been changed. But apparently, that was the plan all along. When it was pointed out via Twitter (by @Puckguy14) that the numbers looked a lot like those of the MLB's San Francisco Giants, a response came from the guys who actually do the jersey customizations for the Bulls, Junkyard Athletic.

@puckguy14 @icethetics @sfbullsThe font is indeed the Giants.Reebok's mockup showed standard block, just to show name + numbers.

— JunkyardAthletic (@JnkyrdAthletic) October 4, 2012

They also added that that was the team's plan from the beginning. (I think someone has an unhealthy attachment to the Giants. What happened to building your own identity?)

You may also note that conspicuously absent from these jerseys is any sign of a shoulder patch designed by one of our talented Icethetics artists. A week before the Bulls unveiled their jerseys, they said they'd be interested in looking at secondary logo proposals from our designers.

Well, they were interested in a couple but after a communication breakdown, the whole idea went nowhere. So instead, the jerseys feature the ECHL's 25th anniversary patch on the right shoulder and another smaller patch on the left that I haven't been able to make out. (Looks like it says BAT or something.) Can't tell if it's a sponsor or some kind of memorial patch.

Photos from San Francisco Bulls official website

I can't say I'm impressed with the uniforms and I still hate the logo, but I do like how Justin Bowers and his teemmates keep giving the horns to Bulls fans at the Cow Palace.

Does seeing the Bulls' uniforms in action change your view on them? Love 'em? Hate 'em? The comments await.

New Sweaters with Ties to Tampa

With no Tampa Bay Lightning hockey to follow at this point in the fall, I'm a little lost and turning to the minors for comfort. And it just so happens the Bolts' AHL and ECHL affiliates are sporting new uniforms this season. So let's have a look.

Photos from Rochester Americans and Syracuse Crunch official websites

It happened with the Norfolk Admirals a few years ago and now it's happening to the Syracuse Crunch, who opened their season last night wearing not quite what you'd expect. For a team that just unveiled a very blue logo this summer, I'm surprised to still see so much orange in their uniforms.

But who knows what goes on behind the scenes with these teams? It could very well be that the rebrand happened too late in the game to get the uniforms completely overhauled. (Plus, they probably still have a lot of orange gear leftover that they need to sell, right?)

What's cool: The lightning bolt down the pants. Crunch players are actually wearing the same pants as their NHL affiliate. (You can even see the NHL shield on them in the photo above.) This is useful for two reasons. For one thing, it ties the branding of the two teams together. But more practically, players who are getting called up already have a key piece of their gear in tow.

What's not cool: The white Lightning logo over orange on the right shoulder. Someone at SME has to be shaking their head over that. I would've at least used the blue bolt if the shoulders had to be orange. Which brings me to my other point: Why not make the shoulders blue? These are obviously not recycled jerseys. They're new, with the blue piping added all over the place. Fix it.

That's all I have to say on Syracuse for now. Their home opener is tonight so I assume we'll get to see the other jerseys. I'll add photos as an update to this post later on.

Photo from Florida Everblades (Facebook)

Also this season, the ECHL's Florida Everblades are celebrating their 15th anniversary along with their 2012 Kelly Cup championship. You can see both represented in the photo above as the team hit the ice in their new green anniversary sweaters and raised a special banner last night.

By the way, that Blades game was also the first time that expansion team Orlando Solar Bears hit the ice. You can see what their uniforms looked like in action for the first time on their Facebook page. The Orlando Sentinel also has a neat side-by-side shot of both teams' uniforms.

Interestingly, both of these games required extra time to decide. The Everblades won on a goal 26 seconds into overtime while the Crunch fell to the Rochester Americans in a shootout.

Update on Sunday · Oct 14 · 2012 | 1:28 AM PDT by Chris

Turns out, the Crunch were just wearing an alternate jersey on Friday night. We know that because on Saturday night, they unveiled their actual home and road jerseys. They look like this.

Photo by Jeremy Houghtaling (@JGHoughtaling on Twitter)

You'll note that the alternate jersey in this photo is the opposite of the white jersey the Crunch actually wore on Friday. That means they actually have four different uniforms in their arsenal this season. Seems a bit excessive. Is the attachment to orange all to do with the university?

I'll leave you with a look at the new white jersey in action.

Photo by Scott Thomas Photography

Two sidebars. 1) Check out the 75th anniversary jersey the Hershey Bears are wearing! (That means four jerseys for them too, because they unveiled home, road and alternate sweaters with their rebrand over the summer.) And 2) Does anyone know what the standard is for AHL uniforms? Do they usually wear white at home or on the road? And does it switch midseason like it does in the ECHL?

Wranglers Roll Out New Uniforms

Back in July, we got our first look at the new look of the ECHL's Las Vegas Wranglers. The team kept its color scheme but launched a whole new set of logos. Then last week, they debuted their new home sweater during a preseason tilt which introduced us to even more logos! But more on that in a sec. First, take a gander at the new uniform.

Wow, is it red! Really red. As Icethetics reader Jeannette H. pointed out, what ever happened to finding that balance in your color palette? Before this, the Wranglers wore almost solid black. Now they've swung completely the opposite way.

Add to that, I count four different logos on that uniform, including the ECHL 25th anniversary patch on the right arm.

So between the graphic above and the one to the right, we have our logo bases covered — the crest which prominently features Las Vegas in giant letters, the shoulder patch made up of a big W, a tiny LV and the new shield shape (new since the July unveiling), and finally the 10th anniversary logo comprised of a pair of fives.

For a better look at the Wranglers' new red road jersey, reader Matt McCall sent in this shot from the team's merchandise counter. It's the same design as the white with the colors flipped.

Photo by Matt McCall

Nothing earth-shattering in Vegas, but now we know how the Wranglers will look this year.

Gladiators Mark 10 Years in Georgia

Before we dive in, two things: 1) I'm back. The The IceHL 2012 Yearbook — a labor of love and some intense work over the last few months — is finished! And 2) that means I'm getting back to the blog. And even though it's been a quiet year, I'm determined to find ways of keeping Icethetics interesting. Even if I have to make up news.

For today, however, I don't have to make anything up.

The ECHL's Gwinnett Gladiators unveiled their 10th anniversary logos last Thursday. During the 2012-13 season, they'll be celebrating "A Decade of Excellence and Achievement," as they put it. Of course that's ignoring the eight previous years the club spent in Alabama as the Mobile Mysticks.

The Gladiators primary 10th Anniversary Season Logo is a stylized number ten with the distinctive Gladiators head profile logo incorporated into the zero. It also features roman numerals along the side denoting the years of operation, 2003 to 2013. The Gladiators will also utilize a secondary logo that features a roman numeral "X" incorporating the classic "G" shield/sword logo version and stylized banner indicating the team’s tenure.

The Gladiators are affiliated with the Phoenix Coyotes. And most of the people at their games used to be Thrashers fans, right? There's gotta be a joke in there somewhere about fans getting shafted. I'm just not clever enough to find it.

Guys, the IceHL Yearbook was a huge weight off my shoulders and I'm tired of seeing this page so static. There's been a lot of news I haven't covered over the last month or so and it's my goal to put it here with new posts every day or at least every other day for the next several weeks.

After that? I don't know. Maybe we get some Top 10 lists going. We all like lists, right?

And let there be NHL hockey before 2013... please!

Update on Monday · Sep 24 · 2012 | 11:51 AM PDT by Chris

So about that joke I was looking for... Zack M. emailed in to let me know the Gladiators have been selling this T-shirt.

Ouch. That's just salt in the wound.

But it is funny. (Sorry Thrashers fans. You deserved better.)

Update on Tuesday · Sep 25 · 2012 | 1:12 AM PDT by Chris

Last update, I promise. Just saw that the Gladiators tweeted a photo last week of some new pucks with one of their 10th anniversary logos on them. They also feature the ECHL's 25th anniversary logo.