TCU unveils new football uniforms for 2015 season
TCU’s new Nike uniforms made a grand entrance on quarterback Trevone Boykin, receiver Josh Doctson and former TCU and current Carolina Panthers defensive back Colin Jones after the Horned Frogs’ spring game Friday night.
The “Mach Speed” uniforms feature a new lizard-print pattern on purple and white color schemes for home and road games, respectively, as well as an alternate gray option.
From a distance, the varying shades of purple or gray almost resemble camouflage, which most players agreed was their favorite feature.
The Horned Frogs will have three new lizard-scaled helmet choices — purple, gray and white with a purple, scaly stripe — as well as the chrome and all-white options from last season.
In a nod to the final line of TCU’s traditional chant “Riff Ram,” Nike printed “Give ’Em Hell” on the inside collar of the jerseys.
“Everything’s been getting so wild,” coach Gary Patterson said. “These uniforms are more about going back to tradition and the product itself. How light they are, how they breathe in heat, and they’ll go along with all the rest of the helmets and jerseys and everything else that we have that represents TCU football.”
Patterson said the new uniforms were ordered before last season and were not Nike’s reward for the Frogs’ most recent success, but rather TCU’s elite status with the athletic apparel giant.
“We had some really good recruits that are here, in the top five or six in the state of Texas,” Patterson said. “So for us, having them here, giving them a chance to see what our student body looks like, what our players look like, what our stadium looks like, what our new uniforms look like, that’s what it’s all about. It was a fun night.”
After the conclusion of the spring game, Patterson invited the estimated 10,000 fans onto the field at Amon G. Carter Stadium for the uniform unveiling, which included a video of the new duds as well as smoke and fireworks as each player-model entered the field from TCU’s locker-room tunnel.
The Frogs faithful who went down to get a closer look liked what they saw.
“I think they’re different and I think they’re cool. It’s kind of moving on with the new styles of jerseys,” TCU student Simeon Jones said.
As Patterson and TCU athletic director Chris Del Conte know, in the business of collegiate football, if the players and potential recruits are happy, success tends to follow.
“At the end of the day, the kids like them,” Del Conte said. “Every two or three years, we’re always coming out with a new uniform combination. It’s just another iteration in that progression.”
This story was originally published April 10, 2015 at 10:52 PM with the headline "TCU unveils new football uniforms for 2015 season."