The Nittany Lion
Official Nittany Lion Athletic Logos—
Prior to the 1942 debut of the Nittany Lion Shrine near Rec Hall, Penn State athletics and its teams didn’t really have any type of logo that represented them. Pennants, for example, commonly had the words “Penn State” sometimes with a lion’s head that frequently was the incorrect African lion with a mane. The Nittany Lion statue gave teams an accurate and very much-needed logo, of sorts, that relegated the Pennsylvania State College/University seal to educational and official school business. For the next 30+ years, the Lion Shrine served as Penn State’s athletic image—Note: The Lion Shrine has also appeared on special football jerseys created for the “Generations of Greatness” games beginning in 2017.
In the mid-1970’s, a new modern logo surfaced and the Pozniak Lion (see below), as it came to be known, was seen on everything Penn State right alongside the Lion Shrine logo into the 1980’s. But by 1983, Penn State football was coming off its first national championship under Joe Paterno and the athletic department had a “lightbulb moment” and wanted its own look—a lion logo that it owned. Trademarks and wordmarks revolving around college sports had often been left unprotected for decades, but that was ending. The fight to gain control of football TV rights from the NCAA (which would be won in 1984) was also showing the schools the value of their names, images, and likenesses. The original NIL so to speak. Sound familiar? And the beginnings of the long-running Nike relationship (1983-2026) might have also played a role in Penn State’s new-found awareness of team logos and trademarks.
On Sept. 9, 1983, the brand new “oval shaped lion head logo” debuted just ahead of the home opener of the new football season. It features a side view of a lion’s head within an oval typically facing right with white design elements over a navy-blue background—sometimes seen with its stylized “Penn State” wordmark. Although the new logo would not appear on the face of football tickets, on Beaver Stadium Pictorial program covers or on football media guides until the 1984 season (see first ticket below), it would soon be seen everywhere. Printed game day information handouts and roster flip cards for the press box media carried the new logo and its associated wordmark at all 1983 games. One of the new logo versions would be painted in the endzones beginning that first fall (last seen in 2004 season), finally added to football jerseys at the base of the neck beginning in 2013 (see middle image below), and would briefly appear on helmets at the front base of the blue stripe in 2020 & 2021. The oval lion also prominently appeared on the face of the original press box at Beaver Stadium (torn down in 2025) and on some design variations of PSU’s Nike game footballs starting in the 2000’s. Early critics suggested the oval lion head looked more like a "fat cheeked chipmunk”, but the logo survived and has become instantly recognizable as the symbol of all Nittany Lion sports teams.
In 1996, Penn State rolled out a football-only logo, the “Pride of the Lions”. It featured several variations of a realistic looking lion head in a three-quarters view (facing either right or left) with a stylized “Penn State Nittany Lions” wordmark on a flowing banner. It was also the first to incorporate silver in the color scheme with the traditional navy blue and white. It was intended to become PSU’s primary football logo, and it served that role into the early 2000’s before falling into a seldom used secondary status. It was first seen on the covers of Beaver Stadium Pictorial in 1996, but interestingly, it never appeared on Penn State season tickets. It did, however, appear on some Penn State away game tickets (at Ohio State in 2000-see above & at Boston College in 2004). It only made a brief appearance on PSU football uniforms as part of the 1997 Fiesta Bowl patch seen on the left front shoulder of the jersey. It was never painted in the endzone in place of the oval lion logo, but it did appear over the south endzone’s player tunnel entrance for a period of time.
The Pozniak Lion Logo—
Actually, the first “modern” Nittany Lion logo was created by Ray Pozniak, PSU alum and graphic artist, circa 1974. The so-called Pozniak Lion graphic featured a straight-on look at the face of the Nittany Lion Shrine. And it was effectively “loaned” to Penn State University primarily for use with athletic and alumni endeavors beginning in the mid-70’s in place of the “official seal” of the university and/or images of the Nittany Lion Shrine. It was, in a sense, an “unofficial official” Penn State logo where the university itself did not hold the trademark or copyright on the image. Still, the Pozniak Lion was used heavily prior to 1983’s debut of the “oval sideview Lion head logo” that has continued in heavy use into the 21st century. And the Pozniak Lion is, in fact, still “officially” used by the Penn State Alumni Association (Lion Ambassadors for example) and has been seen over many years on PSU Alumni Association automobile specialty license plates in several states around the mid-Atlantic region.
Despite never technically being an “official” Penn State logo, the Pozniak Lion was seen on very official-looking PSU traffic signs guiding drivers to the Beaver Stadium area for a period of several years beginning in the mid-70’s (see photo from 1978 above). Penn State cheerleaders wore the logo on some of their outfits in this same timeframe (see photo below) and Nittany Lion football players wore navy blue blazers with this logo on the 1979 Sugar Bowl trip. Circa 1975, the Penn State Athletic Department raised funds by selling Pozniak Lion art in the form of engravings and needlepoint via brochures enclosed with football ticket offers. If you have travelled on some of the bowl trips with Penn State, you will also have seen this logo at Harrisburg’s airport promoting its connection with the official Alumni Association/Nittany Lion Club Bowl Tours (2017 Rose, 2017 Fiesta, etc.-see below). But, unlike the long-running oval lion head logo that followed it, the Pozniak Lion never appeared on Penn State football uniforms or helmets.
The Pozniak family wished to continue its relationship with Penn State Athletics, but by 1983, PSU and other colleges had become keenly aware of protecting long overlooked school and sports trademarks/wordmarks, so the University opted to begin creating its own official logos (Oval Lion, Pride of the Lions, University 1855 Shield, “Zombie” Lion, etc.) replacing the Pozniak Lion in many, but obviously not all, cases. For a period of time in the early 2000’s, the Pozniak family attempted to market their lion logo on caps via a website called “The Cat ON the Hat”.
CLICK HERE FOR THE INTERESTING HISTORY OF NITTANY LION SHRINE VANDALISM
CLICK HERE FOR THE HISTORY OF THE NITTANY LION MASCOT
Cheerleader wearing Pozniak Lion in photo below is from the 1978 football season
Nittany Notes:
When the oval lion logo debuted in 1983, there were actually two versions of it. The most commonly seen version is the one with white graphic elements over the navy-blue background giving the lion’s face a primarily blue appearance. There was also an “inverse” version of the common logo where the white and blue color scheme swapped places giving the lion’s face a primarily white overall appearance.
The “inverse” white-faced version was initially the one used in the endzones at Beaver Stadium for the 1983 and 1984 seasons and then it literally disappeared never to be seen again. The regular, blue-faced oval lion logo would finally appear in the south endzone in 1993 along with a Big Ten logo in the north to celebrate the Lions debut season in the conference. This logo would then appear in one or both endzones (with one exception for the 1999 Pigskin Classic game when a sponsor logo appeared in its place) through the 2004 season when it gave way to the block letter “PENN STATE” look in 2005. Note: The 1993-2004 endzone design would re-appear in 2025 for the Homecoming game vs. Northwestern.
The “inverse” white-faced lion logo was used on the cover of four Beaver Stadium Pictorials in 1984 (Rutgers, Maryland, Syracuse, Pitt) serving as the letter “o” in Pictorial, but this was a one season wonder never to be seen again. The “inverse” lion face might have been the one that gave critics the ammunition to call the oval lion logo a “fat chipmunk” (see below).
NOTE: Despite the durability of the blue oval lion logo over the years, it has never managed to make an appearance at the 50-yard line of Beaver Stadium. In fact, Penn State is believed to be the only FBS school to have never had a logo of any type at its 50-yard line.
