Irish Breakdown

Notre Dame Unveils New Football-Only Leprechaun Logo for 2025 Season. What's the Fan Reaction?

Notre Dame unveiled a cool new football-specific Leprechaun logo on Thursday. What do Irish football fans think?
Jared Shlensky|
Jan 19, 2025; Atlanta, GA, USA; The Notre Dame Fighting Irish logo in the end zone at Mercedes-Benz Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Kirby Lee-Imagn Images
Jan 19, 2025; Atlanta, GA, USA; The Notre Dame Fighting Irish logo in the end zone at Mercedes-Benz Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Kirby Lee-Imagn Images | Kirby Lee-Imagn Images

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Notre Dame Fighting Irish

The Notre Dame leprechaun has represented the Fighting Irish for over 60 years, but on Thursday, the athletic department unveiled a different type of leprechaun. It's a football-specific leprechaun logo.

Notre Dame’s New Football-Only Leprechaun Logo Sparks Mixed Fan Reactions


Don't get me wrong, the design is great, and the social media videos are A+ quality, but I don't like the whole concept. Yes, it's unique. But for a school that's based on its rich tradition, core roots, values, and principles, I'm not so sure the new logo fully embodies that.

The timing of it is perfect with Notre Dame's season opener against Miami just over a week away, but the whole premise ... it's fine. It's fun.

You can even purchase the new "Football Leprechaun Collection" via the school site, which should make ND a decent amount of money over the next couple of days.

Another thing I don't like about the logo is how the leprechaun doesn't look like a member of the Fighting Irish, instead, he looks like a member of the "Running Irish". Via an X post on Thursday, Notre Dame said, "This logo, drawn from a legacy known around the world represents Fighting Irish Football."

As for how social media reacted to the news, well, it seemed like there were more negative responses than positive ones.

Hopefully, that will change over the next couple of days. Obviously, how former players and the current players and coaches feel is probably more important than people on social media, but if that response is bad, too, this could be a big miss by the Notre Dame marketing and public relations department.

It'll be interesting to see what the baseball, basketball, soccer, lacrosse, etc. logos will look like --
assuming Notre Dame does a specific logo for each sport -- and how fans will react, but as long as the football team starts winning, everything will be just fine.

It could represent a new look into cementing itself into a consistent superpower that's constantly in the national title chase.

So maybe I'm the anomaly here, but I'm not a fan of the change. The leprechaun with his fists up is a trademark for Notre Dame, especially the football program - why change it?

Few colleges or universities that have a football-specific logo, which is unique in its own right, but I'm a traditionalist, and like it the way it was.

But again, as long as Marcus Freeman's team gets a win over Miami, and keeps rolling from there, everything will look fantastic.

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Jared Shlensky
JARED SHLENSKY

Jared Shlensky is a contributing writer for On SI and a freelance play-by-play broadcaster. Jared was previously a sports betting writer for Yardbarker, an On-Air YouTube Personality for the Sports Geek and a minor league play-by-play broadcaster

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