No. 3 seed Houston will try to upset NCAA powerhouse Kentucky on Friday night in the Sweet 16, and if you’ll undoubtedly notice during the game that each school’s logo appears to be… exactly the same?
Kentucky has used a similar interlocking UK design for decades, but made an alteration to the ‘K’ in 2015 that was polarizing for some fans.
According to UK Athletics, the logo uses a custom “Kentucky Block” font, which “fuses modern foundational forms with universal functionality that is undeniably Kentucky.”
Houston, meanwhile, updated its logo in 2012 to an eerily similar interlocking design, which uses a nearly identical font – which might not be so undeniably Kentucky, after all.
There are slight differences in the font if you look closely. Kentucky’s block letters are wider and larger, overall, while Houston’s lines are a bit thinner. Still, the two logos are nearly the same, but officials from both schools have no idea why.
Via Kentucky.com:
“We have certainly noticed the similarity,” in the university logos, says Jeff Conrad, University of Houston assistant athletics director. “I don’t have the explanation for why they are so similar.”
Jay Blanton, the executive director of UK’s public relations and marketing department, says Kentucky knows “of no connections in the logos or their designs.”
Twitter user Corey Danks noted that each school’s previous logo also happened to be strangely similar.
