The Louisiana State University Tigers have been changing up their uniforms quite often this season. In fact, they’ve worn six different uniform combinations this season.
So it should come as no surprise to find out the Tigers will be eschewing their stardard gold/white/gold uniforms when they meet Baylor in this season’s Texas Bowl.
They’ll be wearing white helmets and pants, along with purple jerseys.
The Tigers are the home team for the @TexasBowl but will be wearing ⬜️🟪⬜️ against Baylor pic.twitter.com/6fQmKt6os9
— LSU Football (@LSUfootball) December 18, 2024
Note in the tweet above that the Tigers are the home team. Also, note the qualifier “but” in the tweet text.
If the Tigers are the designated home team, it would follow that they would wear their stardard gold/white/gold, right? Not quite. The team explained a bit further in a quote tweet shortly thereafter:
The bowl assigns jersey colors to each team and the home team is designated to wear a dark color.
— LSU Football (@LSUfootball) December 18, 2024
Aha. So the Bowl requires LSU to wear dark (purple) jerseys. Fair enough. But why the white/purple/white combination instead of gold/purple/gold?
The team wore that combination only once this season, a victory over UCLA. They also wore the white/purple/white combination once this year, for the season finale against Oklahoma in Death Valley. So LSU is undefeated in purple jerseys.
And why did the team need to explain that the Texas Bowl is responsible for assigning jersey colors and home teams have to wear dark, as opposed to the Tigers’ traditional home white jersey? Fan blowback.
There were a fairly large number of LSU fans this year who haven’t been happy with the team wearing so many different uniform combinations, and originally mistook the Tigers’ tweet to mean the team itself had chosen to wear purple jerseys for the game. So, hoping to mitigate some of that blowback, LSU felt the need to explain that the jersey choice was not theirs to make.
Fans probably still won’t be completely satisfied with the uniform choice. Afterall, just because the Tigers are required to wear their purple jerseys, they could have elected to pair those with their traditional gold helmets and pants, rather than the white.
The team finished the 2024 season with an 8-4 record (and was undefeated in purple jerseys). The Baylor Bears, their opponents for the Texas Bowl, also finished 8-4 but LSU finished the season ranked No. 27, while Baylor finished as the No. 34 ranked team. That gives LSU the “home” designation.
So why did LSU choose white helmets and pants over gold? As we learned earlier this year, LSU does have a uniform protocol, so it’s likely that the players themselves decided on the combination.
I’m disappointed the team won’t at least be in gold/purple/gold for this Bowl game, as I’m sure are many long-time fans, but the white/purple/white will still look good on the field.
Your thoughts?
LSU deserves to never win another game again
Out of curiosity: why do you say that?
Because they chose to dress like this. It’s one thing to look mediocre. It’s a worse thing to look mediocre when you have the ability to look good.
LSU’s gold/purple/gold combo is really a great combo, and they rarely wear it. This screams of “we can have many mix and match options, so let’s change it up for the sake of changing it up.” That said, if the players chose, it, so be it I suppose.
It looks like they are chafing at a rule they made for themselves, and want a little more latitude to tinker with their appearance.
I assumed Baylor was going to counter by going all-white, but surprisingly they’re going gold/white/green… with script helmets!
link
Won’t be a bad looking game after all.
This game will be quite the looker imo. Not too much yellow/gold clashing.
Sharp dressed (young) men!
Maybe LSU got Baylor’s tweet and they decided not to have the same color of helmets? Either way: Tigers and Bears, oh my!
As an LSU alum, the fan blowback is hilarious to me. LSU’s set doesn’t have a singular bad piece – be it white, gold, or purple. I love the purple jersey and I think this is going to be a great looking matchup.
Couldn’t agree more. Honestly I think the y/w/y might be my least favorite combo. Might just be cause I’ve seen it so much and I like some variety, but I like them mixing and matching.
Totally fine with this combo – LSU looks good in everything.
This isn’t a bad look by any means. The white helmet is a clean retro look that pairs well with the bright purple and yellow. Now, I believe this looks better as white/purple/yellow, or yellow/purple/white, but again, that’s not saying this is a bad look at all.
That’s pretty common for LSU…. They have done this numerous times for bowl games. Hate to sh@t on all the haters.,,,,
Not really common considering LSU wore the same gold-white-gold combo for 19 consecutive years in the postseason (including both CFP games following the 2019 season).
They had a special uniform for the 1997 Independence Bowl, which consisted of white helmets, gold jerseys and white pants. And they’ve worn purple a handful of times in bowl games when forced to do so (Nebraska forced LSU to wear purple in the 1983 Orange Bowl, LSU wore purple in the ’85 Sugar and Georgia Tech wore white as the home team in the 2000 Peach, forcing LSU to purple).
In a vacuum, the LSU uniform variety is fine, but it’s a school that traditionally uses a gold helmet and gold pants and it’s been that way since the ’50s. That’s why a good part of the fan base doesn’t like it. As a alumnus and a life-long fan from birth, I feel comfortable in expressing the opinion we don’t need all of the alternate uniforms. Personally, my favorite is the gold/purple/gold because I love the purple jerseys, and I don’t like the practice of wearing white jerseys at home for any football team. I hate the white helmets and pants because of the stupid, giant white stripe in the middle of the striping patterns on both. They look terrible, and neither is a traditional LSU uniform piece.
Looks good but I am not an expert on LSU and I hate their coach.
Count me as an LSU fan who hasn’t enjoyed the parade of different combos this year. There’s too much weird mojo around that program to mess with tradition, Kelly needs to keep it simple and stick to the script.
I’m ok with this as it wasn’t their choice, but I still would have preferred yellow helmets and pants.
LSU can’t go wrong. All of their uniform elements are top notch.