Each collegiate team, if branded well enough, will have distinctive design elements that set apart their competition attire from their rivals—think Stanford’s patented Cardinal red, or Ohio State’s buckeye leaf graphic. Colors often set teams apart within the same conference, but in the absence of rhinestones on men’s uniforms, another trend has emerged out of Champaign, Illinois: player numbers. Dating back roughly a decade, each gymnast has had a unique number on the back of his uniform for the duration of his Illini career, not unlike hockey or football.
The quest to put numbers on gymnasts’ backs began in 2012 at the Winter Cup, where then assistant coach Daniel Ribeiro was unsure why numbers were still being assigned per meet and had to be pinned to the athletes. That frustration drove him to study in depth how numbers were used to procure fan engagement in other sports, and possible ways to bridge fan behaviors into men’s gymnastics.
“You look at America and it’s football, baseball, basketball. There’s a lot of things that they do that already work,” Ribeiro said. “These little things I try to figure out—what do these other sports have that make it a little bit more enjoyable, easier to follow, and a little bit easier to understand?”
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