Don’t mess with the perfect Texas and Michigan football uniform combo

On Saturday in Ann Arbor, Michigan, the Texas Longhorns and Michigan Wolverines will provide an iconic sight for more than 100,000 people in the Big House and several million viewers on the broadcast. It will be the most predictable — yet most compelling — of all the fitness checks.

They will be sporting two of the best looks of all time — the Longhorns in their road whites, the Wolverines in their home maize and blue. They are perfect.

Helmets have endured for decades as the most recognizable symbols of entire universities. Texas’s cap has sported the Longhorn logo since 1961, and Michigan’s “winged” design dates back to 1938. (In fact, Michigan coach Fritz Crisler brought the design back from Princeton, which may indicate an original use for the winged helmet, but has much less connection to it.)

Jamie Morris, a Michigan quarterback who played there in the 1980s and was for a time the school’s all-time leading running back, had three older brothers who went to Syracuse. He decided to become a Wolverine.

“I just loved Michigan helmets,” he said years ago. “That’s why I came here.”

Woe to any sporting director or coach who tries to change them.

“We’re the most traditional program in the country,” Texas State athletic director Chris Del Conte said last year. “We have a great logo. We have great colors. It’s unique. … We don’t have to sugarcoat it. I’m a firm believer in that.”

“Every time you turn on the channel and you look at (the field), you know who the University of Texas is. That’s what it’s all about. I always tell our kids, ‘Embrace who we are.’ It’s not old. It’s not stuffy. It’s Texas. It’s the best.”

These same specific uniforms have been worn by both schools during their biggest victories over the past 60 years.

Michigan wore its home blue uniforms on Jan. 1, 1998, when the Wolverines defeated the Washington State Cougars in the Rose Bowl to clinch a share of the national championship. It wore the same combination on Jan. 8 when it crushed the Washington Huskies in the College Football Playoff championship. Those are the program’s only two national titles since 1948.

Texas wore its road uniform — white helmet, white jersey with orange numbers and lettering, white pants — on Dec. 6, 1969, when it beat the Arkansas Razorbacks in the “Game of the Century,” paving the way for a national title. And it wore the same all-white uniform on Jan. 4, 2006, when Vince Young swept past the USC Trojans and into Texas legend in the Rose Bowl.

(The only noticeable changes for Texas between 1969 and 2006 are the cleats, which went from black to white, and the face masks, which went from gray to white. Other than the orange lettering and piping on the jersey and the Longhorn logo on the helmet, everything is now white. There was a flirtation with orange stripes on the pants in the 1970s and early 1980s, but that has long since passed.)

It was also the only game Michigan and Texas played in the same uniform, the 2005 Rose Bowl — the Horns in white, the Wolverines in blue. It was another game in which Young left the defense gasping for breath. The Longhorns won that thriller by a score of 38–37.

So this is an extremely rare rarity. Texas has played 1,374 games dating back to 1893. Michigan has played 1,394 games dating back to 1879. This is only the second time they have met on the field.

My list of the best traditional home uniforms in college football is as follows:

1. UCLA Bruins
2. Michigan Wolverines
3. USC Trojans
4. Auburn Tigers
5. Pittsburgh Panthers

My list of best traditional road uniforms is shorter:

1. Texas Longhorns
2. LSU Tigers

“The moment we go out on the road in our whites,” says former Texas All-American Michael Huff, “it’s something special. Our uniform is so iconic.”

Huff, now the director of player development at Texas, was a star on the 2005 national championship team and is currently a nominee for the National Football Foundation Hall of Fame. He was also very particular about his uniform, especially his white away uniform. Before games, he would spread everything out on the floor—helmet, jersey, pants, cleats, shocks, wristbands, sleeves—and make sure everything looked exactly how he wanted it.

“The egg whites need to be crispy,” he says.

The complication, of course, is that white uniforms don’t stay white very long. It’s a dirty sport. Playing on natural grass leaves stains. Blood flows. Sweat pours in buckets. Helmets are streaked with collision marks.

And as anyone who does laundry knows, after a while, whites can be hard to keep clean. Huff was the guy who asked for new pants when his old ones started looking drab.

“The equipment crew is very good at keeping things clean and fresh,” Huff says. “The white uniforms, in particular, have to be kept in pristine condition, looking brand new.”

Brand new, yet eternally old. Some programs love alternate uniforms — but those are usually places with less tradition. Places that have won forever — like Texas and Michigan — don’t mess with the look that’s associated with success.

“I don’t want seven different jerseys and three different helmets,” Huff said. “That speaks for itself. You don’t need anything else. Anywhere in the country, anywhere in the world, you see that Longhorn and you know exactly what it is.”