Middle Tennessee State University Athletics
“Ok, Let’s do it” — Salute to Veterans and Armed Forces helmet stripes promise to impress
11/10/2021 6:00:00 PM | Football
MT Equipment staff puts together amazing tribute to all six branches of the armed forces
MURFREESBORO, Tenn. — Summers in a collegiate athletic department can feel a bit lazy compared to the hustle and bustle that happens once teams' seasons are underway. Of course, that's never the reality, with recruiting, practice planning, strength and conditioning workouts all keeping each team's coaching staff busy.
But perhaps the busiest room in the Murphy Center during those long summer days? Assistant Athletic Director Larry Maples equipment room, where he works ahead on lining up a plethora of equipment orders and designs for each of Middle Tennessee's programs during those summer months.
He's not alone in this effort, assisted by a staff of student managers as well as his two graduate assistants, Jordan Middleton and Patrick Woods. And it was during these summer months when Maples was getting ready to plan the helmet design for the football program's annual Salute to Veterans and Armed Forces Game that he looked down his desk at his two GAs and got an idea.
"I was sitting here at the computer, and it came to my mind 'hey, we need to do something cool this year,'" Maples said. "Since I've been here, we haven't repeated what we do (for this game) at all. And I've got these two besides me. And I was like 'Hey, I've done the last five years just me. Have at it, propose to me some cool ideas on what we could do.'"
Maples' two lieutenants took the initiative and ran with it. Middleton, a former quarterback for the Blue Raiders, looked through some other team's patriotic helmets for inspiration. We considered a camouflage design for the helmet decal, but ultimately thought the Flag MT logo was too pretty to pass up.
After a month or so of planning, he and Woods had put their heads together and come up with this: keep the Flag MT decal on the white helmet, but design a unique helmet stripe for each branch of the armed forces and then distribute them throughout the team so each branch was relatively equally represented.
"I'm like 'alright, how will that look?'" Maples said. "They sat here and played on the computer and put some concepts together and I was like 'ok, ok, let's do it.'"
What came out of that design session, and some back and forth with Maples' decal company of choice, Schutt, was six stripes for the six service branches: Army, Navy, Marines, Air Force, Coast Guard and Space Force. Each taken from some design element already present within the military branch.
The long black stripe with yellow trim for the Army, for instance, directly plays off of the organization's "Army Strong" logo, Middleton pointed out. Others, like the deep navy and grey of the Space Force stripe and the red, white, and blue Air Force one, take this inspiration from their branch's official seal, which is emblazoned on the back of each stripe.
Probably the most unique inspiration was the Coast Guard design, modeled after their "racing stripe" that was often found on coast guard ships.
"It's kind of different because it's not symmetric," Middleton said. "Even when we got the proofs back, it was symmetric, so we had to correct that."
The original plan was to distribute the stripes perfectly even amongst the team. No. 1 would have an Army stripe, No. 2 would have a Navy stripe, and so on. But after Middleton brought up the unique painted helmets for each position group Navy wore for the 2015 Army-Navy Game, Maples quickly had the idea to assign each position group a military branch that best represented them.
The offensive line will wear the black and yellow Army stripes, because they compete in the trenches like the army historically has. Linebackers are a position group that is full of go-getters, and are few in numbers, but proud, so the Marines made the most sense for them. Defensive linemen often serve a role of deterrence for opposing offenses, which is exactly what a major purpose of the Navy is. That, coupled with the fact they compete against the O-Line, made the six-striped blue and yellow Navy stripe perfect for the defensive line.
Quarterbacks and Wide Receivers were almost too easy to pick: they'll be wearing the red, white and blue Air Force stripe because of their prowess through the sky. And defensive backs often operate on an island in man coverage, so the racing stripe Coast Guard made the most sense for them. And running backs operate in space, while kickers and specialists take pride in attacking the field from the sky, so the newest branch, the Space Force, fit nicely for them.
"This one is going to be one of the most unique ones, because there's not really many times you're going to go to a ballgame and see six different stripes on helmets," Maples said. "The coolest thing is going to be when fans get there in pregame, and you see all the positions going through warmups together."
Maples hopes that the different stripes will spark discussions amongst fans as they watch warmups pre-game against FIU, and perhaps give everyone just another chance to think of our veterans and service members during a day that will be filled with opportunities to honor them.
For his equipment guys, fresh off a sixth straight 28-21 win in their equipment staff rivalry game against Western Kentucky, they're just glad their helmets that they collectively spend hours each week will get a little extra attention.
"Our group of guys, they're each responsible for twelve sets of helmet (decals)," Middleton said of the equipment room's student managers. "So we'll give them a deadline, like Thursday before practice, and they've got to have all their helmets decaled. Some guys are better about doing theirs a week in advance, some guys will do it Wednesday night. They've gotten better at doing it since the beginning of the year. It takes them maybe five minutes to get a helmet good and ready."
As for Woods, who took the point on most of the design process, he just hopes some folks outside of Murfreesboro will get a chance to see it.
"I hope we get a lot of recognition," Woods said.
But perhaps the busiest room in the Murphy Center during those long summer days? Assistant Athletic Director Larry Maples equipment room, where he works ahead on lining up a plethora of equipment orders and designs for each of Middle Tennessee's programs during those summer months.
He's not alone in this effort, assisted by a staff of student managers as well as his two graduate assistants, Jordan Middleton and Patrick Woods. And it was during these summer months when Maples was getting ready to plan the helmet design for the football program's annual Salute to Veterans and Armed Forces Game that he looked down his desk at his two GAs and got an idea.
"I was sitting here at the computer, and it came to my mind 'hey, we need to do something cool this year,'" Maples said. "Since I've been here, we haven't repeated what we do (for this game) at all. And I've got these two besides me. And I was like 'Hey, I've done the last five years just me. Have at it, propose to me some cool ideas on what we could do.'"
Maples' two lieutenants took the initiative and ran with it. Middleton, a former quarterback for the Blue Raiders, looked through some other team's patriotic helmets for inspiration. We considered a camouflage design for the helmet decal, but ultimately thought the Flag MT logo was too pretty to pass up.
After a month or so of planning, he and Woods had put their heads together and come up with this: keep the Flag MT decal on the white helmet, but design a unique helmet stripe for each branch of the armed forces and then distribute them throughout the team so each branch was relatively equally represented.
"I'm like 'alright, how will that look?'" Maples said. "They sat here and played on the computer and put some concepts together and I was like 'ok, ok, let's do it.'"
What came out of that design session, and some back and forth with Maples' decal company of choice, Schutt, was six stripes for the six service branches: Army, Navy, Marines, Air Force, Coast Guard and Space Force. Each taken from some design element already present within the military branch.
As part of this year's Salute to Veterans & Armed Forces game, our helmets will feature stripes representing the branches of the military.#BlueRaiders | #EATT pic.twitter.com/vV25YhYfWW
— Middle Tennessee FB (@MT_FB) November 10, 2021
The long black stripe with yellow trim for the Army, for instance, directly plays off of the organization's "Army Strong" logo, Middleton pointed out. Others, like the deep navy and grey of the Space Force stripe and the red, white, and blue Air Force one, take this inspiration from their branch's official seal, which is emblazoned on the back of each stripe.
Probably the most unique inspiration was the Coast Guard design, modeled after their "racing stripe" that was often found on coast guard ships.
"It's kind of different because it's not symmetric," Middleton said. "Even when we got the proofs back, it was symmetric, so we had to correct that."
The original plan was to distribute the stripes perfectly even amongst the team. No. 1 would have an Army stripe, No. 2 would have a Navy stripe, and so on. But after Middleton brought up the unique painted helmets for each position group Navy wore for the 2015 Army-Navy Game, Maples quickly had the idea to assign each position group a military branch that best represented them.
The offensive line will wear the black and yellow Army stripes, because they compete in the trenches like the army historically has. Linebackers are a position group that is full of go-getters, and are few in numbers, but proud, so the Marines made the most sense for them. Defensive linemen often serve a role of deterrence for opposing offenses, which is exactly what a major purpose of the Navy is. That, coupled with the fact they compete against the O-Line, made the six-striped blue and yellow Navy stripe perfect for the defensive line.
Quarterbacks and Wide Receivers were almost too easy to pick: they'll be wearing the red, white and blue Air Force stripe because of their prowess through the sky. And defensive backs often operate on an island in man coverage, so the racing stripe Coast Guard made the most sense for them. And running backs operate in space, while kickers and specialists take pride in attacking the field from the sky, so the newest branch, the Space Force, fit nicely for them.
Army - Offensive Line
— Middle Tennessee FB (@MT_FB) November 10, 2021
Navy - Defensive Line
Marines - Linebackers
Coast Guard - Defensive Backs
Air Force - Quarterbacks & Wide Receivers
Space Force - Running Backs & Specialists pic.twitter.com/5d5x06maOd
"This one is going to be one of the most unique ones, because there's not really many times you're going to go to a ballgame and see six different stripes on helmets," Maples said. "The coolest thing is going to be when fans get there in pregame, and you see all the positions going through warmups together."
Maples hopes that the different stripes will spark discussions amongst fans as they watch warmups pre-game against FIU, and perhaps give everyone just another chance to think of our veterans and service members during a day that will be filled with opportunities to honor them.
For his equipment guys, fresh off a sixth straight 28-21 win in their equipment staff rivalry game against Western Kentucky, they're just glad their helmets that they collectively spend hours each week will get a little extra attention.
"Our group of guys, they're each responsible for twelve sets of helmet (decals)," Middleton said of the equipment room's student managers. "So we'll give them a deadline, like Thursday before practice, and they've got to have all their helmets decaled. Some guys are better about doing theirs a week in advance, some guys will do it Wednesday night. They've gotten better at doing it since the beginning of the year. It takes them maybe five minutes to get a helmet good and ready."
As for Woods, who took the point on most of the design process, he just hopes some folks outside of Murfreesboro will get a chance to see it.
"I hope we get a lot of recognition," Woods said.
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