For most leagues, the logos that teams present to the public can often make a big difference on the view of the team itself. Every team wants to have a logo that perfectly represents both the city and the name of the team. In the SMJHL, this remains true. As a graphic designer myself, I know the work and effort that can go into crafting the perfect logo. For this deep dive, I’m going to break down my thoughts on the design and the craft of a handful of logos in the league. I’ll be giving each team a 1-10 score, and I’ll provide some reasoning behind my decision. All logo critiques are made based on the team's logo in the portal.

Anchorage Armada: 8/10
I love the design behind this logo, using a fleet of ships to represent the idea of the armada, plus the icebergs in the back showing that they are in a cold climate. I think the design itself is clean and well laid out. It does suffer from a bit of a vector upscaling issue (which will be a VERY recurring theme).

Carolina Kraken: 7/10
Another design that I think does an excellent job of representing the team. My only big critique is that it doesn’t really make me think of “Carolina” in any way. I like the design of the kraken itself, and the text at the bottom feels like a good match with the logo. Again, it suffers from vector upscaling.

Colorado Raptors: 9.5/10
Excellent design. I think the colors chosen work really well together, and the overall composition of the logo is very good. Again, it doesn’t really make me think of Colorado, but I am not really docking points for that. The big points come from being the first logo so far NOT to be a poorly upscaled vector.

Detroit Falcons: 9/10
I am a big fan of birds, and also from Michigan, so my bias might be showing here. The symbolism of a falcon with Detroit is not lost on me, as well as the simple but strong design. It does suffer a little bit from being a poorly upscaled vector, but much less noticeably so.

Great Falls Grizzlies: 6/10
I think this logo is good on paper, but I’m not a huge fan of it overall. The idea of the bear definitely fits both the name and the location of the team. I also want to say, I love the actual design of this bear. However, it suffers from a few different things. I think the amount of detail becomes negative with the number of different shades and things kinda muddying up the logos. It also suffers again from the vector upscaling process. There’s a couple of artifacts from that process, as well as the rounded edges that it often causes.

Kelowna Knights: 7/10
For this last team, I think they have a clean, well designed logo. I like the use of only a few colors, helping to simplify the design but also give the team a good color palette to work with. The choice of only a few colors also appears to have helped the logo survive the vectorization process, as it doesn’t seem to have many artifacts or oddities. Overall, good logo. I think the design is a bit lacking in originality, therefore I docked some points.

Overall, the logos of each team are creative and interesting. They all are well designed overall and a couple have some issues with vector rendering, but I don't blame them since it was most likely made for fun. Please don't take my critiques too seriously, as this is just a fun exercise, I'm not meaning to upset or anger anyone with them haha.

Trent Mackenzie | Vancouver Whalers | Player Page

@Raf_TML It's an unorthodox topic for a deep dive, but it turned out well. Approved!