Just because a helmet logo is a school name or a mascot, and not one single initial (or two) doesn't make it small time. Check out the helmets for Florida, Ole Miss, LSU, Cal, UCLA, Pitt - all P5 programs that have names or abbreviated versions of their names on the helmets. Granted that's not a lot of teams, but if it's around long enough and the program has a period of success with them, they get accepted and associated with that school.
Personally I'd be fine with going back with the block "C", but it's not going to happen.
Re: your examples- Ole Miss is a weird one, don't know how to respond to it- I think we can call that one an outlier.
Pitt and UCLA aren't state flagship schools, which was more the focus of my comments (if thats unclear then apologies for bad writing on my part). Florida's lid is OK- some decent version that said "Huskies" on the side for UConn would be alright- heck use the same font as the Gators in a Blue and White scheme would be light years better than what we have currently. Cripes put a white dog paw on a blue helmet a la Clemson and there you go (I know theirs is feline). No problems with more than 2 letters like Cal (though "Con" has some inherent problems) or LSU- any school that is called "Name of State" State University needs 3 letters.I really liked the early interlocking UC helmet we sported in Edsall's early tenure. I thought it was really nice. Could work for all sports.
I completely agree with your notion about the effect of time on an icon. But 2 thoughts on that. First, I think that people will make a quicker and stronger association if an image "fits" what people already associate with the broader category, i.e., a college helmet that stylistically resembles other college helmets they already know rather than an NFL or XFL or CFL helmet, or worse yet the unassociatable mess we have now. Second, if we're gonna start with something new, could it at least be of some reasonable quality? Can we fans have a little input? What we've got now is a poor attempt at something slick and "high design" that fails utterly and just comes off as cartoonish. Heck, if you want to go the cartoon route then at least really do it. Everybody knows Fresno States helmet- sure the dog is a cartoon but that what its supposed to be. I like it.
If UConn's helmets were even marginally passable I wouldn't say a word about it, but I stilll can't for the life of me understand the choice that was made, nor how it was made. Translation: What the duck* were they thinking?
