Alternate Jerseys to be Worn 9 Times

The Minnesota Wild will wear their green alternate jerseys for nines games this season, according to the equipment manager. Tonight's home game against Dallas will be the first of the nine games. I am currently in the process of finding out the other eight games the alternates will be worn and will post as soon as I know.

New Decals on Player Helmets

New season, new helmet decals. This year's helmets feature the new(ish) wordmark on the back. The white helmet still has the primary logo and stylized numerals from the white jersey. The home helmet is green with the 3rd jersey wordmark and wheat block numerals.

What Could Have Been...

On the Wild's website, there is a slide show of some designs for the potential team in Minnesota, had Wild not been chosen as the name. We have long known about the names up for voting, but this is the first we've seen of any designs. The final names were Blue Ox, Freeze, Northern Lights, Voyageurs, White Bears, and, of course, Wild. Obviously Wild was the chosen name, but the others certainly had potential. All of them fit in nicely with the state of Minnesota. Let's take a look at those...missed opportunities.

Blue Ox:




Freeze:




Northern Lights:




Voyageurs:




White Bears:




After seeing these, I am glad they went with Wild. The Northern Lights had some nice tributes to the North Stars, that could have been pretty cool.

This Day in History

On this day, January 22, in 1998, the NHL's Minnesota franchise selected the name 'Wild'. The Minnesota Wild would begin play in the 2000/2001 NHL season.

Here are a few excerpts from articles written around the time of the unveiling:

Nice touch, the new Minnesota franchise calling a news conference to unveil its new name — Wild — and logo and including Neal Broten in the ceremony. If anyone has done more for hockey in Minnesota than Broten, name him.

But on to the logo, described as iron range red, forest green, harvest gold and Minnesota wheat. Was Minnesota wheat in your box of Crayolas? The Wild, by the way, beat out the Polars, Voyageurs and Blue Ox in fan balloting.

Excerpt from article published in Deseret News


When Minnesota's NHL expansion franchise announced in January 1998 that it would be called the Wild, the obvious question was, "What's a 'Wild?'" The team's response: "Whatever you want it to be."

The Wild's home sweater, unveiled Thursday at the Roseville Skating Center, is dominated by the head of a beast that might be a bear. Or maybe it's a mountain lion? A wolf? A very angry gopher? Who really knows?

And again, that's precisely the point.

"It's a wild picture," chief executive officer Jac Sperling explained. "People will see what they want to see. It's intended to be a wild animal."

Excerpt from article published in Star Tribune


Pretty cool!

It Has Begun

The 2010/2011 NHL season is here! The Minnesota Wild opened today against the Carolina Hurricanes in Helsinki. But I'm not here to tell you about the game. Rather, I have two bits of logo/uniform related news to share with you. First off, the Wild wore special patches for the game. The 2010 NHL Premiere Logo was on the right chest for both teams today.



Also, the Wild did something different with their helmets today. They wore the 3rd jersey helmets with their home jerseys. Hopefully, this is a permanent move. The script logo replaces the circle logo on the green helmets. I did the same thing in my NHL 2012 project, and I really hope the Wild stick with this.





Enjoy the NHL season!

The Changes Are Here

On Saturday, January 30th, 2010, I told you all of some possible changes to the Wild's uniforms. Well, preseason hockey has begun, and those changes have indeed taken place. The first thing I said was that the Wild would be wearing different pants. Actually, they would just wear the alternate, stripe-less pants full time. And I was correct.



Here are last year's pants for comparison:


I also spoke of possible changes to the road jersey. And changes have been made. The old shoulder patches have been removed. They have been replaced with an odd rectangular patch with the new wordmark inside.




I think they look awful. I don't mind the wordmark itself, but the rectangular patch is bad. Perhaps they are preparing for an all-new road jersey? One can only hope.

The original Wild wordmark has now been completely phased out. Say good-bye to the first Wild logo ever...


And finally, it appears the 10th Anniversary patch is only being worn on the alternate jerseys. Darn, I wanted to see it on all 3.


So, there you have it. That is basically your uniform season preview.

Changes Coming Next Year?

According to several different sources, the Wild may be making a few uniform changes next season. The pants the Wild wear may be different. Minnesota currently has two different pants, the lighter green with the red and gold stripes, and the darker green, worn with the 3rd jerseys. All sources indicate a change to the darker green pants full time. Also, there is some speculation about a possible new road uniform, but nothing is official yet. Hopefully we get a lot of concepts for a new road jersey!