What's A "Garnet Charger"?

There was a bigger announcement that came out of the NCAA today regarding one school's name. Union College has had a men's hockey program since 1903 and a women's program since 1999, and they have respectively been called the Dutchmen and Dutchwomen for many years. That "Dutch" name goes back to 1933 when it was used in a football headline, and the school recognizes it as "a nod to the Dutch, who settled in the region in the 1600s," but Union College also makes clear in their land acknowledgement that the land was home to Iroquois Confederacy long before the Dutch arrived. Today, though, the Dutchmen and Dutchwomen are no more as Union College moved to a new name for its athletic teams that takes effect immediately. Welcome to the Garnet Chargers era! What is a Garnet Charger, exactly?

Back in February, Union College decided to undergo a rebranding in order to move forward so that they can potentially attract more students while keeping current students more engaged with the university during their time at the school and beyond. Among the suggestions was an idea to drop the Dutchmen and Dutchwomen monikers that the hockey tams had worn so prominently for decades. Obviously, there was some pushback, but Union College forged ahead by working with students, alumni, and other stakeholders in branding itself for the future.

By May 2, Union College had made the decision to move on from the Dutchmen and Dutchwomen monikers. Over 2100 submissions were fielded by Union College officials, and the school went ahead and narrowed that collection of names to the twenty they felt would best represent Union College moving forward which was then reduced to four: Garnet Chargers, Garnet Griffins, Garnet Hawks, and Garnet Storm. The school had wanted to use Garnet as they had done from 1866 to more recent times, but Swarthmore College in Pennsylvania already has that name trademarked. Ergo, the finalists are all "Garnet"-something in order to hold onto that history, it seems.

Just as an aside, if every name has the same colour in front of the second word, it's probably overkill to include it in the name. In this case, if a "Garnet Charger" is something that no one has ever heard of, the addition of the colour seems unnecessary. The Union College Chargers actually sounds better than the Union College Garnet Chargers, so have the teams wear the colour proudly, but including the colour in the team name just makes it clunky to say and people will omit it anyway. But I digress....

Bianca Ring, the Opinions Editor of the Concordiensis, wrote a fantastic piece on February 24 that addresses ideas for new names as well as some of the negative feedback the school was facing over the suggestion of retiring the Dutchmen and Dutchwomen names. There were several name suggestions she endorsed which would have been solid replacements for the Dutchpeople names, but it was her paragraph on Schenectady, New York's history and the tie-in to electricity that makes one realize how the "Chargers" part got included in the final name selection. She writes,

"Union College Professor of Physics and Astronomy Francis Wilkin suggested 'Evie the Electron,' citing Schenectady's roots as a city built around the General Electric company. Schenectady is the Electric City, after all, and Union has a long history of contributions to help the city live up to this name. Professor Wilkin also added that Evie the Electron being a girl would emphasize that STEM is not only a field for men, and that Union is proudly represented by many women in STEM. Personally, I appreciate this particular reference to Union's history a lot more than the reference to some of our founders' Dutch heritage."

When it comes to the four finalist names, choosing one that references the history of the school always seems to be a favorite among school administrators. While Griffins, Hawks, and Storm aren't particularly bad suggestions and may actually be better for marketing purposes, naming the school's teams after the history of the city in which Union College is found combined with the efforts of the school in making that city known for something is a good way to generate community support from citizens and corporations in the area.

A historical school team name combined with a historical reference to the area in which the school resides? That's almost elementary in knowing what name a school would pick, and that's how we arrived at the new name of "Union College Garnet Chargers". Back in May, the school recognized that not everyone would be happy with these names as they wrote in their release, "We realize that moving away from Dutchmen/Dutchwomen will disappoint some members of our community, especially among our alumni - many of whom represented the College proudly as a member of one of our athletic teams during their time as students," but the change was coming one way or another. Today, that change was made official.

With players such as Shayne Gostisbehere, Troy Grosenick, Daniel Carr, Courtney Turner, Dania Simmonds, and Rhianna Kurio all having reached the professional hockey ranks after playing as Dutchmen and Dutchwomen, it will be somewhat different to call them the Garnet Chargers this season. As the "U" in the logo at the top shows, though, the marketing might work well with respect to the logo on the front of the jerseys. It won't be the same Union teams we've come to see over the years, I admit, but the rebranding does give them a lot of new paths to walk when ready.

The Garnet Chargers era began on August 3, 2023. What are your thoughts on the new branding? Are you a fan of the name and logo shown above? Should it just be shortened to Chargers? This blog has zero effect on the final decisions made by Union College, but I'm curious what people think of the new branding. Personally, the "Garnet" in Garnet Chargers feels unnecessary, but that's just this writer's opinion.

Go Garnet Chargers? Yeah, that's gonna take some time to feel normal.

Until next time, keep your sticks on the ice!