Pioneer Football League

Pioneer Football League


BUTLER	CAMPBELL	DAVIDSON
"Bulldogs"	"Camels"	"Wildcats"
Indianapolis, IN	Buies Creek, NC	Davidson, NC


DAYTON	DRAKE	JACKSONVILLE
"Flyers"	"Bulldogs"	"Dolphins"
Dayton, OH	Des Moines, IA	Jacksonville, FL


MOREHEAD STATE	SAN DIEGO	VALPARAISO
"Eagles"	"Toreros"	"Crusaders"
Morehead, KY	San Diego, CA	Valparaiso, IN

Comments

Campbell will be playings its first season of football in 2008 as a member of this conference. The university has provided information indicating that the team will be using the helmet design shown above.

Historical Helmets

BUTLER


c.early 1970s - 1989	1990 - 2005	2007 (second half of season)
		*see note 1 below


2006 - 2007; 2008 -

*1 Beginning with the October 13, 2007 game at Valparaiso, Butler removed the decals from its football helmets and proceeded to use "blank" helmets for the remainder of the season. It has been reported to me that this decision was due to a defect in the decals, and that the team intends to use the "bulldog head" logo on its helmets again in 2008.

CAMPBELL


2008 -

DAVIDSON


1985 only?	1994? - 1995	1996 - 2005


2006 -

Drawings of other historical Davidson helmets may be found at this link (I have not independently verified the accuracy of the drawings). The drawings show that the team has apparently used a large number of other helmet designs through the years, many with a "D" logo on the sides. Photographs of these earlier helmets would be appreciated.

Davidson played football as a member of the Southern Conference for many years up to 1975, and again from 1983 through 1986, though it did not play a full league schedule during the latter period and was ineligible for the league championship. Davidson joined the PFL in 2001.

DAYTON


1975 - 1985	1995 -

From 1986 through 1994, Dayton used a design that was very similar to the older helmet shown above, but a royal blue outline was present around the white letters. Older helmets may have included one with a "UD" logo.

DRAKE


c.1965	c.1967	c.1971


c.early 1980s	c.1991 - 1992	1993 - 1999
	*see note 1 below


2000 - 2002	2003 - 2004	2005 -

A 1997 newspaper article about the retirement of Drake's long-time equipment manager indicates that the team had used nine different helmet designs since the mid-1970s, so there are obviously many others that I would like to add to this page. This photograph accompanied the article and shows one interesting design used during the early- to mid-1980s; I would appreciate additional information about this helmet and any of Drake's other historical designs. The c.1987 helmet has been described to me as having "matted silver" shells with "Drake" in blue letters and in a script font said to be similar to that used on Duke's helmets from 1979 through 2003.

A Drake player, Johnny Bright, was involved in an incident during a 1951 game against Oklahoma A&M that led to the NCAA mandating the use of faceguards on football helmets. A late hit against Bright (documented in a series of photographs that won a Pulitzer Prize in 1952) fractured his jaw, but he eventually recovered and went on to a Hall of Fame career in the Canadian Football League. Here is a link to an article about the "Johnny Bright incident".

*1 A helmet design essentially identical to this one was used from 1988 until this one was adopted; the only difference being that the mascot "Spike" was somewhat less detailed on the earlier helmet. For at least part of this period, only a few players had the decal on BOTH sides of the helmet; the right side appears to have been the default side for those who did not get two decals. Throughout these years (1988 - 1992), the helmets were of a matted silver finish rather than the metallic silver that was used from the mid-1990s onward.

JACKSONVILLE


1998 -

Jacksonville had an intercollegiate football team for the first time in 1998, and the current helmet design is the only one the team has used.

MOREHEAD STATE


c.early 1980s	1997 - 2004	2005 -

I have received descriptions of a few other Morehead State helmets from recent years; photographs of any of these would be appreciated:

1989 - 1993: helmets were yellow with "bright blue" facemasks, blue-white-blue center stripes, and a "wrap-around" logo said to be similar to that used by the NFL's Seattle Seahawks;
1994: Same as previous helmet but now with an "M" logo similar to the one on the 1997-2004 helmet; the two outlines around the "M" were white and blue in color;
1995 - 1996: Same as previous helmet but the white outline around the "M" was changed to transparent (so it became yellow);

Thanks to John M. for this information. I suspect that the team has had a large number of other interesting helmet designs through the years, so additional information would also be appreciated.

SAN DIEGO


1991 - 1995	1996 - 1999	2000 - 2004


2005 -

There are probably a number of other historical helmet designs for San Diego, as the school has had a football team since 1971, and also in 1960 and 1961 (and earlier), but I have not yet received any information about earlier designs.

VALPARAISO


1962 - 1963	1967 - 1968	1974


1976 - 1977	1984 - 1985	c.mid 1990s


? - 2005	2006 -

I have received partial information about some earlier helmet designs used by Valparaiso:

1969: helmets were gold with a black football-shaped logo containing the numerals "100" in some unspecified light color;
1971 - 1972: helmets were gold with brown-white-brown stripes and a logo consisting of the letters "VU" in brown with white outlines (see blurry photograph "A" below);
1973; 1975: helmets were like the 1974 helmet shown above, but with a logo on the sides; the logo is a cartoon "fighting crusader" that is similar to the one in picture "C" below, but with some slight differences. "B" is a blurry photograph of the 1973/1975 helmet.

I would appreciate some clearer photographs than these, as well as copies of the helmet logos for the two helmets in the photographs.