The power T is "old" and if you review logos of sports teams many are old. And then fans of football teams get excited if throwback uniforms are returned, or used in a bowl; contests on which way and how wide the stripe on the helment. The NFL finds players who use green colored cleats.
The issue is very clear - males who follow UT football would like to dictate or mandate conformity from women teams, as does the seller of athletic goods. And it just happens the team they want to conform is the most successful athletic team and the only reason they are pushing it is the most famous coach in UT history recently died.
for a couple of reasons.
First, logos get dated and look old--some more so than others, depending on the design. Companies and athletic departments often change and/or modernize their logos--my daughter's school modernized their logo two years ago. The new logo is much better looking. The fact that a school has kept the same logo for a long time certainly doesn't mean it's a good logo--it means only that it hasn't been changed. The Power T logo is old--but it has been tweaked over the years. More to the point, it has worked over time because it is very simple in design AND because it is a strong-looking T. That is WHY it is called the Power T. There is nothing strong about the Lady Vols logo--it evokes women wearing aprons.
Check out the T on our football helmets in the 1970s. They are thin and not very strong looking. It wasn't a "power" T. What happened? The design was changed--the T made wider, for one thing--and at some point became the Power T we know today. Because it is so simple--a T--it doesn't need to be changed a lot, and yet still is from time to time. The Lady Vol logo is not simple, and it very clearly looks old. It is time to retire it in the same way that Summitt realized that the name Volettes was lame.
Second, the idea that the men just want to impose their will on a women's program is nonsense. You want uniformity in an athletic department--it is efficient; it is common sense. Having separate athletic departments doesn't make financial or common sense, and neither does have multiple team logos.
When the UT women's basketball program started, there were virtually no other women's sports. There was no Title IX or equality in sports. Now that there is equality--and anyone who's not a complete neanderthal should be very thankful for Title IX, the diehards want to stay separate. It is silly. Times change.
Find me other university sports programs that have a logo and ID separate from all the others sports program at the school. Are there ANY? Do the UConn women have their own logo? Does the UNC women's soccer program--20 national titles? No, they don't. Schools have a single sports logo--twas ever so.
You can't cling to the Summitt era--and yet many do, out of nostalgia. That's why we still have Warlick as our coach, and why we have a logo that reflects our style of play--dated. Those who cling to the past merely impede progress.
