Mascot for University of Illinois?

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#428      
Anyone ever suggest the Fighting Illini Red Tails?
Could reference both the hawk and the Tuskegee Airman, first activated in Rantoul btw...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red-tailed_hawk
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tuskegee_Airmen

The costume is even on sale!!!
https://www.mascotcosplay.com/red-tail-hawk-mascot-costume.html

I'm going to show my southern Illinois roots here...but much of central and southern illinois was and still is based on oil and its production....those that worked on drilling rigs were called Roughnecks....having an oilfield worker (Roughneck) as the mascot....blue shirt and pants and orange helmet .....something along the line of Purdue's mascot...but different.......one draw back is that Roughneck sounds too much like Redneck...but it would be original and has some connection to some of the history of this state.
 
#433      
Why does the university insist on acting out groundhogs day on this mascot debate? My only thought is they are hoping everyone gets to the point of being upset we have to hear about this ever 12 months and just begs for someone to choose something. We don't need a mascot. Plenty of team survive without one. You can't tell me general sentiment on this issue is growing more positive. Any mascot they bring on is going to be met with a bigger opposition than support and I would be a large amount of money/beach houses its out within the decade it's introduced.

The war chant pisses me off more than the chief/mascot issue as it stands. I can fully grasp the racial tones the Chief sent off. Whether I think it's racist or not really doesn't matter (and shouldn't). But seriously drums and brass instruments can be construed as racist? Still beyond me.

As long as they don't touch the 3 in 1 and fighting illini (which even knowing the true meaning behind it i can see it getting removed) I'm fine with the status quo. A new logo might be nice, but I have no clue what it is (#notTeamShieldButtItsKindaNice).
 
#435      

KrushCow31

Former Krush Cow
Chicago, IL
Any mascot would conceivably change our name as well I assume. We're not gonna be the University of Illinois Fighting Illini War Eagles. I think that part is what bothers me the most. If you really want a new mascot, make not a Fighting Illini ala Tennessee with their Volunteer. Yeesh. We don't need a whole makeover.
 
#436      
Any mascot would conceivably change our name as well I assume.

Incorrect. Getting rid of Fighting Illini has never been on the table in any way, shape or form and it's bothersome that people keep making that assumption.

I understand raising that issue from a "if you give them an inch they'll take a mile" perspective, but I think it's a mistake to try and fight a war no one is waging.
 
#437      

Illwinsagain

Cary, IL
Any mascot would conceivably change our name as well I assume. We're not gonna be the University of Illinois Fighting Illini War Eagles. I think that part is what bothers me the most. If you really want a new mascot, make not a Fighting Illini ala Tennessee with their Volunteer. Yeesh. We don't need a whole makeover.
Alabama Crimson Tide has an elephant and Auburn Tigers have a War Eagle. Only 2 examples off the top of my head for non-related mascots to team name.
 
#438      

ILL in IA

Iowa City
I just don't see a mascot that works here. With the grounds that have been set, they will not be using any PC version of the chief or Native American imagery. So cancel out the hawk with a headdress or animal dressed up like that.

And then we go to the core of where the Fighting Illini name came from. IMO an actual student or someone in costume as a soldier looking like they are about to fight in the trenches isn't a good look. UofI has already gone to great lengths to honor those who gave everything to go and fight with the names on the columns ect. I just feel a soldier mascot cheapens that.

After you cross out those 2 direct links to the history and namesake, you start to make some very loose connections to the state or history that just don't elevate the athletic department or game day experience. And if you can't do that, why do it at all.
 
#439      
Alabama Crimson Tide has an elephant and Auburn Tigers have a War Eagle. Only 2 examples off the top of my head for non-related mascots to team name.

"Fighting Illini" isn't like "Fighting Sioux" or whatever. That's not the etymology. Obviously it's been used that way from time to time, and the Chief complicated it somewhat, but it's not a "Native American Nickname".

Don't concede that premise. It's not true.
 
#441      

ILL in IA

Iowa City
Alabama Crimson Tide has an elephant and Auburn Tigers have a War Eagle. Only 2 examples off the top of my head for non-related mascots to team name.
But even those examples have a history to them and why they came to be. I feel like if there was an example of that or a legend with Illinois history that would lend itself to a mascot, we would know it by now.
 
#443      
Abe is the obvious thing. But you'd have to do it more lightheartedly than Josh Whitman could ever announce at a podium.

Leave it alone. If the demand truly exists, the drunk 19 year olds with nothing but time on their hands will fill it, and it will be dumb and funny and charming on TV, and that's the path.

The Stanford Tree mascot, to this day, is not officially recognized by the University. That's the model.
 
#446      

Illwinsagain

Cary, IL
"Fighting Illini" isn't like "Fighting Sioux" or whatever. That's not the etymology. Obviously it's been used that way from time to time, and the Chief complicated it somewhat, but it's not a "Native American Nickname".

Don't concede that premise. It's not true.
If memory serves, which could very well be wrong, Illini predates the WW1 "fighting illini". The Illini nation, for which our state was named, is from Native American Origin, as is the state's name and many, many towns, lakes, rivers, etc.
 
#447      
If memory serves, which could very well be wrong, Illini predates the WW1 "fighting illini". The Illini nation, for which our state was named, is from Native American Origin, as is the state's name and many, many towns, lakes, rivers, etc.

The name Illinois, from which the term "Illini" is derived, is this super convoluted game to telephone and mistranslation from one Native American language to another, to French, to English. It's the history of the state itself, in that way, which is pretty cool.
 
#448      

ivwilsoniv

Aurora, IL
Can't we just get a guy dressed like a WW1 soldier? Any of these would be a potentially interesting concept to start the discussion and would be true to the actual inception of the name "Fighting Illini."

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#449      
Alabama Crimson Tide has an elephant and Auburn Tigers have a War Eagle. Only 2 examples off the top of my head for non-related mascots to team name.
I think that Iowa State's Cyclone name with the red bird mascot is another example. Like Alabama, the name Cyclone came from something else, in ISU case a newspaper story about ISU came in like a cyclone and blew someone away (I think Northwestern, but not sure on that point).
 
#450      

KrushCow31

Former Krush Cow
Chicago, IL
Alabama Crimson Tide has an elephant and Auburn Tigers have a War Eagle. Only 2 examples off the top of my head for non-related mascots to team name.
Fair enough. I'm saying for myself though that's the only acceptable mascot change I would be okay with.
 
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