If you haven’t heard the news, Boise State now has an all-black uniform set for their football team. Even though their team colors have no trace of black in them, adding black to their set is something that other teams have done in the past.

What’s with this fascination of infusing black into the mix? More importantly, why is it the cool thing to do?

What sucks about this Boise State set is that even though the helmet does have a pretty neat design, the entire set follows a trend that every team still seems to have.

(Other victims of this trend: Duke, Kentucky, Washington, Tennessee… and there’s more.)

BLACK VERSION OF CURRENT HELMET

– Take the current helmet and just add black to it. Example: VA Tech.

MATTE

– Instead of adding a shine to it, how about we make the helmet a flat matte? Everyone’s doing matte. Example: Mizzou.

GRADIENT NUMBERS

– It’s the 1990s again where gradient is hip and happening. Nope, it’s been done before. Example: Maryland.

NEW GLOVES, ARMBANDS 

– This is a great opportunity for the team to bust out new gloves and armbands! The brighter the better! Example: Oregon.

CLEATS

– By the way, we’re also giving you new cleats to wear. Example: LSU.

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So what have we learned from Boise State? They are following all the common trends in the NCAA football universe now. And for a school that tries to be unique, they look just like everyone else.

This was way too predictable and it’s a shame they went this route. Now everyone, wear black to the stadium! It’s so cool! Let’s all look like Darth Vader! Well done, Nike.