The Art of the Patriotic Hockey Sweater

Last week’s Veterans Day and Remembrance Day commemorations brought a slew of patriotic uniforms to hockey rinks around North America. One of the designers responsible for creating the patriotic sportswear is Jeff Tasca of the Toronto-based company Athletic Knit. Tasca designed themed jerseys this year for the ECHL’s Kalamazoo Wings, Reading Royals, Brampton Beast, Quad City Mallards, Fort Wayne Komets, and Tulsa Oilers.

Creating distinctive jerseys while walking the fine line between patriotic and tacky is a significant task for a designer. “The big challenge is making something that fits the team’s vision, looks unique, and isn’t too over the top—unless that’s what the team wants,” Tasca said. “Coming up with the patriotic jerseys, I try to always have something different for each team. Trying to incorporate some patriotic elements, but not make it look too garish. Some teams prefer to have a little more of a ‘loud’ jersey, some want the camouflage, some prefer it to be more subtle.”

“In pretty much all of them I worked in the stars and stripes into the jersey along with some other elements,” Tasca said. “Each team having certain patriotic elements in the jersey, but also having each team have their own unique look.”

For some jerseys, like the Kalamazoo Wings (above), starting with a logo that was already red, white, and blue made for a simple transition to a patriotic jersey.

Some teams, on the other hand, went with an entirely different look from their normal brand. “The Reading Royals wanted to go all out and have an eagle on the full front of the jersey instead of their lion head logo,” Tasca said.

The Brampton Beast was the first Canadian Remembrance Day jersey Tasca had created—a project with a personal connection given that his sister is in the Canadian Military. (“I did show the jersey design to her and she was a fan,” Tasca said.)

“I had a few images that I used, Canadian soldiers from WW1 on the front and and from WW2 on the back,” Tasca said. “I used a more modern-looking soldier on the sleeve design with a Canadian flag running up the arms. That way I could try to represent all soldiers on the jersey, from WW1 to the modern day soldier.”

The jersey features a quote from the poem “For the Fallen,” commonly associated with Remembrance Day.

Of course, you can’t have military jerseys without camo, and three of Tasca’s fit that bill, in varying degrees of intensity, ranging from the subtle Komets (above) to the full-blown Mallards (below). “In a couple of these I added a camo pattern in the main body of the jersey, but kept it toned down, so that you would have to look a little closer at the jersey to see it was there,” Tasca said.

The Quad Cities Mallards (above) and the Tulsa Oilers (below) actually altered their logos in the themed jerseys.

There are more military-themed jerseys coming shortly after the new year, so be ready for more red, white, blue, stars, stripes, maple leafs, and camo to come.