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Uni Watch

Louisiana High School Team Plays 1st Half in Red, 2nd Half in Blue

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There was a crazy high school football game last Friday in Shreveport, La., as Evangel Academy hosted Neville High in a driving rain. The photo above shows how the teams looked at the start of the game — Neville in white, Evangel in mono-red.

The rain made for a very muddy field, as you can see here:

 

Thanks to the slippery conditions, the game was scoreless at halftime. But there was a surprise at the start of the third quarter, as Evangel — the home team — had swapped out their wet, muddy red uniforms for fresh, dry blues!

I didn’t even know that was legal, but I guess it is, as long as the basic color-vs.-white format is still in place.

The rain kept coming down, so the blue uniforms soon got muddy as well:

 

The uni switcheroo didn’t help, as Neville ended up winning, 8-0. I’d say they deserved it, if only on the basis of their band, which kept on playing in the storm. Check this out (the end of this clip also has the best footage of the muddy field):

Here’s one of the Evangel players doing a quick postgame interview regarding the uni swap:

(Big thanks to longtime reader Chris Mycoskie for bringing this game to my attention, and to 318 Sports for documenting the proceedings so well.)

 
  
 
Comments (18)

    I remember Ole Miss changing jerseys at halftime back in late ’70’s or early ’80’s. One half would be red and the other blue.

    Memories of when Sir Alex Ferguson had his Manchester United team switch out of their infamous grey away kit into their blue and white striped third kit in April 1996. They were down 3-0 to Southampton at halftime, and the switch didn’t help much as they ended up losing 3-1.

    Seems like it should be illegal, no? Away teams don’t have the luxury of being able to change. (At least not at the HS levelC where bringing a bunch of extra unis might mean adding another vehicle expense.)

    Maybe not illegal, but perhaps a bit of a “privilege” flex? Just showing how much money is being spent on three sets of football uniforms while the girls’ sports at the same school get nothing.

    #TitleIX

    Good point, but Evangel Christian Academy is a private high school, not subject to Title IX.

    What are you talking about??? This isn’t the 1980s.

    Every high school I know of, all the girls teams have 3-4 different uniforms. I’m talking about public schools too and I don’t live in a rich area.

    I played in a game like that in HS. We lost to our biggest rival 2-0 when our punter had a ball go over his head and out of the end zone. That was a tough loss.

    My middle school team once changed jerseys at halftime. We were penalized 15 yards on the 2nd half kickoff. Apparently our coach told the officials before hand, knew it would be a penalty, but still wanted to do it.

    In a basketball game at Maryland in the 80s or 90s, Virginia changed from orange uniforms to blue at halftime.

    In a lacrosse game against Johns Hopkins in 1979, Maryland changed from white jerseys to red at halftime. Their coach said white wasn’t enough contrast against Hopkins’ light blue.

    Do you have any more details or recollection on the UVA uniform switch? Never heard of that before. Might need to do some research.

    Sorry, no more details. For the life of me, I can’t recall what year it was.
    But I distinctly remember it happening.

    Back in my sophomore year of high school (1985), my St. Raphael Academy Saints were playing our arch-rival Toleman on Thanksgiving. We came out our white away jerseys for the scoreless first half, but at halftime our coach told us to dig into our lockers an get our purple (sorry, Paul) home jerseys. We wore them for the second half, and won the game by a score of 8-0.

    That band is Persevering with a capital P. And the Evangel player has great deadpan humor. I think home teams should be able to do this, but away teams as well. As long as the colors do not clash. In pro soccer you never see players with wet uniforms emerging from the tunnel for the second half, always a dry set available.

    Gerry Faust had ND switch from blue jerseys to green jerseys against Southern Cal. 1983 or 1984.

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