Welcome to this website’s off-season sports sartorial content. We are counting down the world’s top 50 most iconic sports uniforms. Only current uniforms apply, we are not including one-off or alternate uniforms. Let’s stick to the basics.

#35

Penn State Football

We now arrive to our 4th college football team to make the top 50 countdown. Penn State got brought up in the comment section of last week’s Tennessee article and the Nittany Lions sneak ahead of the Vols in our #35 spot.

This isn’t the first or last time we have to debate whether to use a classic team’s home or away uniform. Penn State has a good claim for both of their sets. It’s a close call but I fall firmly on the all-white away uniform for inclusion here today. This was the uniform they wore to beat Georgia in the 1982 season for the school’s first National Championship.

In my opinion, the choice is clear that Penn State should also wear white at home. At least on regular occasion. When I visualize Penn State’s colors it’s always a fresh white background with the dark blue logo or text. I had a family member who did grad school in Happy Valley and I visited when I was super small. The only memory I have today is seeing the gates around Beaver Stadium and getting a tiny white football with a blue Penn State logo.

Of course, the uniform history for the Nittany Lions isn’t very deep. They used to have jersey sleeve and pant stripes beginning in the 1950’s but by the end of the 1960’s the stripes on both were gone and TV numbers were present on the jersey. Despite very small changes, Penn State has worn the same jersey and pants on their standard uniform set for over 50 years.

Their helmets have been on a small journey. In the 1950’s when modern helmets came into practice the navy blue stripe first appeared. Like many other teams across the country, Penn State used gray facemasks when they were added, although white was also used briefly. Blue helmet numbers adorned each side of the helmet but the numbers were also removed for a brief period in the mid-1960’s.

For 1975, the helmet numbers were gone and haven’t been used (aside from alternate throwbacks as seen above) ever since. The gray facemasks were darkened for 1986-87 before a switch to navy blue occurred in 1988 and has been in place to this day.

The school known for its “White Out” home games needs to wear all-white at home.