Illini Basketball Uniforms

The Blues are perfect.

I’ll say it again-I challenge anyone to convince me that there is a better set of college basketball uniforms than the script and 1980s set now worn.

I know I’m biased, but these uniforms look so good. It goes to show what a strong, timeless design can do.

ugottabjoshinme said:

The Blues are perfect.

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OrangeBlue98 said:

I’ll say it again-I challenge anyone to convince me that there is a better set of college basketball uniforms than the script and 1980s set now worn.

I know I’m biased, but these uniforms look so good. It goes to show what a strong, timeless design can do.

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It isn't just an Illini homer take! If you follow college hoops social media accounts, they will sometimes rank the best jerseys and our Script and Flyin' Illini ones have regularly shown up in the top tier of every ranking. Meanwhile, when a a ranking takes our 1LLN1O1S uniforms into account, we get #17 out of 18 in the Big Ten and commentary like this (ignore the last ridiculous sentence from this biased Badgers fan, lol).

"Illinois' uniforms don't match the program's annual ranking near the top of the conference power rankings. Some of its new uniforms are a step forward compared to the one pictured above, specifically those with cursive lettering. Still, an orange-based uniform doesn't rank favorably."

It is absolutely undeniable that (A) our 1LL1NO1S jerseys are unpopular and thought of as bad jerseys by the outside world and (B) our Script and Flyin' Illini uniforms are extremely popular and regularly praised as excellent uniforms even by fans who dislike the Illini. Only throwbacks should be worn the rest of the year to the point where we don't even call them throwbacks!! On that note, I am encouraged that we have not worn an 1LL1NO1S set in any of the previous three games, and overall it's been throwbacks in five of the previous six games ... that is WAY out of line with the pattern in previous seasons, so it gives me hope! However, I won't rest easy until I see us in a throwback vs. Nebraska on Saturday ... in previous years, this was the ultimate "return to the default" game, lol.

I'm trying not to get greedy since we have four EXCELLENT throwback uniforms now, but in a dream scenario where we get the two "missing" sets (navy Script and white Flyin' Illini), I wonder what the debut games would be. We got the orange Script randomly for the LIU home game, which was odd, but the debut of the navy Flyin' Illini was for the highly hyped UConn game. I think if they did have more up their sleeves, they wouldn't want to wait TOO long into the season to debut them, as that cuts down on the time that they can sell jerseys ... but I could also see them wanting to space it out? Here is what I would do:

White Flyin' Illini - Ideally this Saturday vs. Nebraska but maybe Saturday, January 17 vs. Minnesota? Give them what is hopefully a blowout win in their return game??
Navy Script - Either January 11 at Iowa or January 24 at Purdue ... possibly February 7 at Michigan State, but that is getting late!

IlliniCaboose said:

I'll never understand our choices. Navy against Uconn and Orange against Tennessee?
Regardless we were the better looking team in both matchups!

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I definitely agree here, haha. Using football as an example, the road games at Indiana and Wisconsin SCREAMED for finally seeing #BPOTR ... though in hindsight, I am glad that look didn't get associated with either outcome. Using this Big Ten schedule as an example, it seems this should be the general pattern for our games away from home (i.e., when white shouldn't be an option).

Definitely Wear Navy
at Ohio State
at Nebraska
at USC
at Maryland

Definitely Wear Orange
vs. Penn State (Philadelphia, PA)
at UCLA

Either Orange or Navy is Fine
at Iowa
at Northwestern
at Purdue
at Michigan State

Illin618 said:

I'll go ahead and say it although I'm sure some of you are thinking it as well...

orange script uniforms needed white lettering
&
navy throwbacks needed orange lettering

There - I said it.

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Really curious to see what we wear on Saturday. Since debuting the orange scripts we've worn:

Orange Scripts @ home vs Long Island
Standard Orange @ home vs UTRGV
New Blues @ MSG vs UConn
Orange Scripts @ Nashville vs Tennessee
New Blues @ OSU

No discernible pattern yet. But I think this game will be telling. If Nebraska wears red, that almost guarantees that we'll wear white.

If we go White Scripts, that'll show that we're really committed to moving away from Standard Whites as it'll be our 4th straight opportunity dating back to the Alabama game where we could've wore the Standard Whites but chose not to.

If we go Standard White, that would be super lame and show we still have some level of commitment to those jerseys.

Or we could shock the world and break out the Fighting Illini Whites. This would almost guarantee that the Standard Whites have been removed from the rotation.

Do we get an 05 throwback?

Chi2La said:

Do we get an 05 throwback?

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It feels unlikely this year, since we have already gotten two new uniforms this year. If we do happen to get it back, then I will probably be actually annoyed because we should have marked the 20 year anniversary last season.

PizzaHutParkingLot said:

View attachment 45591
So fresh, so clean

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DJ bald guy ref in the background thinking really hard about who he's calling the next foul on

IlliniCaboose said:

I'll never understand our choices. Navy against Uconn and Orange against Tennessee?
Regardless we were the better looking team in both matchups!

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Yeah. With you here.

I was in MSG at that home game for UConn. The only upside of that was that (1) I got to enjoy the block FI blues in their inaugural appearance; and (2) I had to look only obliquely at that hideous blue floor v the overhead, direct TV view.

Will be in The Palestra for the Illini v. Penn State. Am praying for the orange scripts to be worn that evening.

Will we begin my dream scenario of a "color rush" every year at Braggin' Rights?? I feel like our Orange Script was made for this game, with Mizzou always wearing gold. With that said, we are on quite a streak of wearing the White Script ones for Braggin' Rights.

No pride of authorship, as I relied on memory plus 5-second Google Images searches for each year, lol ... but here is the jersey lineup for the last 10 Braggin' Rights games.

YEAR | ILL - Jersey ... MIZ - Jersey

2024-25 | ILL - White Script ... MIZ - Gold Throwback
2023-24 | ILL - White Script ... MIZ - Gold Default
2022-23 | ILL - White Script ... MIZ - Gold Default
2021-22 | ILL - White Script ... MIZ - Gold Default
2020-21 | ILL - Orange Default ... MIZ - Gold Default
2019-20 | ILL - Orange Default ... MIZ - Gold Default
2018-19 | ILL - Orange Flyin' Illini ... MIZ - Gold Default
2017-18 | ILL - Orange Default ... MIZ - Gold Default
2016-17 | ILL - White Flyin' Illini ... MIZ - Gold Default
2015-16 | ILL - Orange Default ... MIZ - Gold Default

Unless I made a mistake, it is pretty crazy that Illinois has not worn navy and Mizzou has not worn black OR white in the last 10 games! My prediction is that we break that streak on Monday and bust out the Navy Flyin' Illini uniforms for this game, with Mizzou once again wearing gold.

EDIT: Again, could use a fact checker ... but it looks like the last year we wore navy was 2013-14 and the last year Mizzou wore something other than gold was 2011-12.

I absolutely love the script, but this should be a FIGHTING ILLINI game every year imo.

Now that we’ve seen the script orange Illinois on a navy background, I’m REALLY intrigued at what a blue script basketball uniform will look like.

Bummed to see the 1LL1NO1S whites the other day, as I was hoping they were history ... hopefully we got to our quota for that cupcake game, and it's throwbacks from here on out. A guy can hope. This is my wish list for the rest of the year.

Orange Flyin' Illini at Penn State ... Need to get these back in the rotation and shake off the stink from the Duke massacre in what is hopefully a win!!
White Script vs. Rutgers
Orange Script at Iowa ... And I hope they wear yellow for a color rush game.
Navy Flyin' Illini at Northwestern
White Script vs. Minnesota
White Script vs. Maryland
Orange Script at Purdue
Orange Script vs. Washington ... Need to bring back the trend of wearing orange at home more!
NAVY SCRIPT at Nebraska ... Bust out this awesome surprise for our revenge game in Lincoln, which will also contrast well with their red.
Orange Flyin' Illini vs. Northwestern ... Appropriate "Orange Out" uniform.
White Script vs. Wisconsin
WHITE FLYIN' ILLINI vs. Indiana ... Bring these bad boys back to complete the full throwback set.
Navy Flyin' Illini at USC
Orange Script at UCLA
Orange Flyin' Illini vs. Michigan ... Channel the energy of our 2021 beatdown.
White Script vs. Oregon
Navy Flyin' Illini at Maryland

EDIT: This is obviously under the assumption that THREE new jerseys to get to a 2005 throwback is insanely optimistic, haha. Needless to say, I think it was a huge miss not to have one last year, and I obviously hope we get one! It would be absolutely epic to save it and bust it out in the NCAA Tournament for some good luck!

The Rutgers home game will tell us a lot about the future of the 1LL1NO1S uniforms, IMO. We were on a streak of five straight games of only throwbacks before the Southern game, and then we returned to a throwback vs. Penn State. It's one thing to "use up" an 1LL1NO1S outing for a home game vs. Southern, but I will bummed that we truly have not moved on from those rags if we sport them vs. Rutgers, haha.

WHITE SCRIPT, please!

Also, semi-OT but I believe there have been a few new uniforms debuted in the Big Ten this year.

Iowa - New White Regular


Iowa - New Black Regular


Iowa - New (Updated) Yellow Throwback


Michigan State - New White Throwback


Purdue - New Black Throwback


And of course...

Illinois - New Orange Throwback


Illinois - New Navy Throwback



Could have missed some, of course. Also, call me biased all you want but ... we have the cream of the crop here by far. Somehow, Iowa's yellow throwback actually got worse!

I personally would rather just have the fighting Illini jerseys (blue, white and orange) and rotate between them. The script is nice don’t get me wrong but I like the look and nod to the chief with the fighting Illini ones

I hope we still have the flyin illini orange jerseys (though I do love the orange scripts too)

Paignmanagement said:

I personally would rather just have the fighting Illini jerseys (blue, white and orange) and rotate between them. The script is nice don’t get me wrong but I like the look and nod to the chief with the fighting Illini ones

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I love the Flyin' Illini set, but why would you prefer only having those over both??

Fighter of the Nightman said:

The Rutgers home game will tell us a lot about the future of the 1LL1NO1S uniforms, IMO. We were on a streak of five straight games of only throwbacks before the Southern game, and then we returned to a throwback vs. Penn State. It's one thing to "use up" an 1LL1NO1S outing for a home game vs. Southern, but I will bummed that we truly have not moved on from those rags if we sport them vs. Rutgers, haha.

WHITE SCRIPT, please!

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So @fighter, as the guru of all things uniform, when do you think we will be able to safely call the throwbacks (Scripts, Fighting Illini) the new standard and the current standard (1LL1NO1S) officially retired?

I’d also like to note, the women’s uniforms haven’t been updated. Does anyone know if it’s customary for men’s and women’s teams to wear similar designs and/or get new designs at the same time?

You guys….I think it’s happening….

redwingillini11 said:

You guys….I think it’s happening….

https://twitter.com/x/status/2009778471883419774

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Timing works with the Purdue game on January 24.

redwingillini11 said:

You guys….I think it’s happening….

https://twitter.com/x/status/2009778471883419774

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Shoulda happened a year ago, but better late than never.

GrayGhost77 said:

Shoulda happened a year ago, but better late than never.

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Agreed 100%. There honestly must have been contractual or supply chain reasons for the delay. Honestly, I wouldn’t be surprised if this newfound effort has something to do with the upcoming expiration of the licensing deal and some effort by Nike to build some goodwill. It does seem hard to imagine Nike gives Illinois all these new uniform sets only for Illinois to sign with someone else for next year.

Regardless, we are about to have the final piece of the puzzle for the best rotation of uniforms in college basketball and I am ECSTATIC!