close
close

Ourladyoftheassumptionparish

Part – Newstatenabenn

The Minnesota Wild will wear the North Stars colors 15 times this season. Will the logo ever return?
patheur

The Minnesota Wild will wear the North Stars colors 15 times this season. Will the logo ever return?

He Wild Minnesota will wear green and yellow alternate jerseys 15 times this season in honor of the North Stars. The throwbacks were first unveiled in 2023, 30 years after the North Stars moved to Dallas. Before moving the franchise, owner Norm Green decided to revisit the team’s iconic “N” logo and color scheme heading into the 1991-1992 season. The team ditched the word “North” entirely and donned all-black sweaters with gold letters and numbers.

what they are saying

FOX 9 recently spoke with fans, former players and team executives about the controversial jersey change as part of a documentary about Minnesota’s departure from the North Stars. In retrospect, some believe that the changes to the team’s name, logo and colors suggest that Green was already working on a plan to relocate the franchise.

“I think when you look back, the uniform change was probably the beginning of the end,” Mark Baribeau said. Baribeau was the equipment manager for the North Stars and still owns one of the first all-black Stars jerseys.

“It was a prototype of what Norm cooked,” Baribeau said. “I thought it was so ugly.”

Mike Modano and Jim Johnson played for the North Stars when their jerseys changed after the team reached the Stanley Cup Finals in 1991.

“We couldn’t believe the logo had been changed,” said Modano, who went on to win the Stanley Cup Finals with the Dallas Stars in 1999. “It had one of the best logos ever made in the game.”

Johnson grew up a North Stars fan before coming to the NHL.

“I remember it vividly,” said Johnson, who joined his hometown team midway through the 1991 season. “It wasn’t a happy time for me because that was the jersey I grew up seeing and dreaming of wearing.”

The team is gone. The debate is still alive.

The Minnesota Northern Stars jersey. (FOX 9)

Kevin Allenspach, who recently wrote a book about the 1991 North Stars team, said the team’s relocation shortly after changing names and jerseys naturally makes fans wonder.

“A lot of people say, ‘Well, when (Green) changed the logo that’s when I knew they were leaving,'” Allenspach said. “I think at that point, the future of the team was definitely still up in the air.”

Lou Nanne, a longtime North Stars player and executive who worked directly for Norm Green after he bought the team, said it was all a coincidence.

“I wasn’t thinking about that, (Green) wasn’t thinking about that,” Nanne said in an interview for the upcoming FOX 9 documentary. “That came about because we were looking for more ways to generate more revenue from the T-shirts. That’s how it started.”

Thirty years later, others close to the team believe Norm Green was already planning his exit strategy.

“The Stars could be anywhere,” said Jack Larson, former director of the Met Center. “The North Stars must be in Minnesota.”

What’s next?

Some fans still hope that Wild Minnesota one day he will return to the North Stars brand, but it is unlikely.

“They say ‘the Savage Land should be called the North Star…we should get the name back,'” Allenspach said. “The Dallas franchise controls that.”

However, the Wild are adopting the old colors more often. They will wear the alternate “78s” for the first time this season on November 1st.

“I mean, those jerseys sell,” Allenspach said. “It’s the perfect combination, you know, because… if you’re a Wild fan, you’re rooting for their team and you still have that throwback Northern Stars feel.”

“NO STARS: When Minnesota Lost Pro Hockey” premieres Nov. 14 on FOX 9 and FOX LOCAL.