Although it is a new look for the football program, the reasoning behind the change is all about unifying Lancers’ athletics while paying respect to the rich history at Cordova. Photo by Rick Sloan

RANCHO CORDOVA, CA (MPG) - If you've attended a Cordova Lancers varsity football game this season, you might have noticed a glaring new change to the team’s uniforms. 

Gone are the long-standing silver helmets with the red, white and black stripe-patterned logo that had been part of the Lancers' look for decades. In their place are red helmets with a bold white "Letter C" logo with black trim, with the font being similar to what the varsity baseball team at Cordova has worn for quite some time. 

Although it is a new look for the football program, the reasoning behind the change is all about unifying Lancers’ athletics while paying respect to the rich history at Cordova.

"Part of it is paying homage to the baseball teams' ‘C,’” Lancers’ head coach and athletic director JP Dolliver said. "(Scott) Ahlstrom has been running with that with baseball for a long time and Guy Anderson. They gave us a little ribbing like, 'That's our C' but it's more to pay homage to the past."

The change has drawn mixed reviews from some of the alumni associated with the historic football teams of the 1970s and 1980s, who would prefer that the traditional look stay in place. But according to Dolliver, the change might not be set in stone long term. 

"It's not necessarily permanent," Dolliver said. "You see what Folsom does, they've got their blues and their whites. We're just kind of playing around with it. We're just trying to get a little bit of an identity. It might be something where we incorporate both (the old helmet and new helmet styles). Maybe we have the stripes come back with the 'C' at some point."

The new helmets look sharp but there is a fine line when you make drastic changes to a team’s logo, especially when there is so much history and tradition involved. For Dolliver and the football program, however, the hope is to usher in a new era at Cordova while still paying the appropriate respect to the past. 

"We want more kids to come here and build their own tradition," Dolliver said. "But at the same time, there's not too many schools that have the tradition that we do, so it's important to have both. It's a balance. It's kind of a cool balance in between."