The “script Cougars” helmets are coming back for Week 4, and Washington State is dusting off a look fans have been waiting to see again.
For the first time since the 2023 season, WSU will bring back the classic script helmet for a big matchup with the Arizona Wildcats. The Cougars will wear the helmet with their traditional home crimson jerseys and gray pants, a combination that will be the 54th different set WSU has used since 2017.
The helmet itself has a long and winding history. First introduced in the 1976 season, the script design replaced the old W-State logo, according to Helmet History.
WSU wore it with a white and crimson stripe through about 1988, then moved to a plain gray helmet without the stripe. From 1988 to 1999, the script helmet was the primary look before giving way to the WSU logo on the helmet.
There was also a Rose Bowl wrinkle in there. Before the script helmet disappeared, a rose was added to the logo for the 1997 Rose Bowl, launching a tradition of placing a rose on the team’s helmet logos when playing in the Rose Bowl.
After that, the script look went away for five years before returning for the 2004 Apple Cup. It showed up again for every Apple Cup from 2005 through 2007.
In 2008, it took on a bigger role, serving as the helmet for six of WSU’s 12 games. That fall also brought a crimson version of the script helmet with the script logo in white, which made its debut for the 2008 Apple Cup and then appeared the next week at Hawaii.
The gray script helmet later came back for the 2009 and 2010 Apple Cups before disappearing again.
WSU teased a return before the 2018 Apple Cup, announcing a standard set with the gray helmet, crimson jersey and crimson pants. Then, right before kickoff, the script helmets were revealed after a week of teaser videos. The combination stood out immediately.
The look was short-lived. The script helmets vanished again, and WSU later experimented with variations, including the first “Wazzu” helmet in 2022 that tried to echo the script style.
The next true return came at the 2023 Apple Cup. Once again, WSU’s Wednesday uniform announcement showed the standard gray helmet with the WSU logo, only for the script helmets to appear during warmups.
Now they’re back again, and they’ll do it alongside WSU’s Crimson and Gray stripe-out for Saturday. The student section and all even sections will wear crimson, while the odd sections will wear gray.
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