2025 Troy Football Uniform Rankings
Things have been a bit crazy at The Trojan Wall since the football season ended. The birth of a new child took a bit of precedence over ranking the uniforms, but now, I’ve got time.
So, in a better late than never type of situation, we are back with the 2025 Troy Football Uniform Rankings.
#14 – vs ODU (1-1, last used 2023)
2025 marked the second appearance of the black/white/cardinal look. A win in 2023 gave the uniform some life, but after the 33-0 drubbing by ODU in 2025, I’m not sure Troy needs to break this one out again.
Regardless of the game, however, this look just does not do it for me. It ranks last here and was #13 in 2023. Some teams, like App State, for instance, can pull off the triple mismatch. Troy can’t.
I think it works best when the team’s non-white colors are a light and a dark. With Troy having cardinal as a deep red and black, the uniform just comes off very dark and one note. The cardinal decal set used here didn’t help any with the Power T almost getting lost in the helmet’s black.
#13 – ULM (2-1, last used in 2021)
I want so badly to like this combination. It’s the third time Troy has used it and I think this is the closest I have seen to getting it right. The first time was the very memorable 2017 Coastal game, where Marcus Jones became a legend, though the digi-camo didn’t really work on that helmet. The second time was the 2021 Georgia State game, where we used the mismatched jumbo Power T decals.
For this one, I think my issue is that the helmet feels incomplete. The jersey and pants have cardinal, white, and black elements in them, but the helmet only has black and white. If cardinal decals or a cardinal facemask were used, I think this combination could’ve ranked much higher. Pairing this look against ULM’s all-black look made for a very bland looking contest.
#12 – Nicholls State (1-1, last used in 2024)
This combination might have one of the biggest year-to-year drops I’ve seen since I have been doing these lists. The black/cardinal/cardinal look was #2 in the rankings. Absolutely nothing changed about the uniform from 2024, but unfortunately for this set, Nicholls’ gray dragged it down and made for an ugly pairing. Much like the ULM game, it was simply too dark to look as good as last year’s.
#11 – Georgia State (9-4, last used in 2024, twice this season)
White/Cardinal/White will forever be this website’s favorite combination. That being said, I don’t really like using it for the Military Appreciation look with the current stripes. The Stars and Stripes look great on the white helmet like always and it works with the standard cardinal jersey.
However, this is the one time the black and cardinal stripes on the white pants don’t work. It creates a disjointed look that doesn’t quite live up to the War Machines of old.
#10 – Jax State (19-49-1, last used in 2024)
I absolutely hate that Troy lost this game, both in general and to a hated historical rival. That being said, I think I like this one just a tick better than the previous. Something about the unity of the white jersey with the helmet and pants makes this one edge out the home version. The Troy script doesn’t hurt either.
The pants stripe and the JSU loss still hurt this one a lot.
#9 – Buffalo (13-18 since 2000, last used in 2024)
The model of consistency, cardinal/white/white lands at #9 for the second straight year. This looked great against the all-black of Buffalo and honestly, feels much better after a win. It gets dropped this low due to the helmet.
I will admit that I’m not sure that adding black elements to it would help, but at least it wouldn’t feel like the helmet was supposed to be part of a different uniform combination.
#8 – Texas State (4-2, last used in 2024)
I felt like the 2025 version of the black/white/black averaged out the performance of the 2024 one. It was used twice last year, finishing at #4 and #12. This iteration was almost identical to the highly-rated uniform vs Louisiana in 2024, but Trojan Equipment swapped out the cardinal facemask with the chrome.
The helmet here works much better with that new facemask, since it functions more as an accent than a focal point.
#7 – Clemson (18-33, last used in 2024)
This was a near-perfect clone of the 2011 matchup between the Trojans and the Tigers. Thankfully for Trojan Nation, the actual game was not and it saw Troy match up with Clemson fairly well, until late in the contest. While it isn’t my favorite away look, it is one that definitely allows the cardinal to be featured heavily, even with the white jersey.
What might have been if Troy still had chrome helmets though…..
#6 – Memphis (9-4, last used in 2024, twice this season)
For the second straight year, Troy repeated a combination in the regular season. This version from week 3 is solidly my favorite version of the white/cardinal/white. I only wish that Troy had pants that only had cardinal stripes, like back in 2018.
That would have made the uniforms perfectly balanced between the two colors and wouldn’t have the seemingly random black stripe.
#5 – Louisiana (2-1, last used in 2024)
After 21 years, it was so heartening to see Marvin finally back on the Troy gridiron adorning a black helmet (and facing the front on both sides too!). For many of us who were introduced to Troy State in the late 90s and early 2000s, Marvin was TSU. I still remember being disappointed at the Hector logo that was chosen to replace it on the videoboards back in 2004.
By adding the stripes to this helmet, Trojan Equipment did something that is very, very rare, though I’m not sure it was their intention. These stripes, along with the logo on a modern helmet, created a kind of faux-helmet from an alternate timeline. I really felt that this is what Troy’s helmet would have looked like, if it never changed names and gotten rid of Marvin.
With all that said, a uniform doesn’t sit at 5, if it’s perfect. My biggest gripe with this one is that if Troy is going to wear Marvin with the black jerseys (the best option, in my opinion), then it needs to fully harken back to the time it was used.
That would’ve meant wearing white pants, rather than black or even cardinal. Silver pants would be the accurate choice, but Troy doesn’t have those and hasn’t for years.
#4 – South (2-0, last used in 2016)
Again, as a fan of the white/primary color/white look, this one just looks great. This black jersey just might be my favorite Troy has used and it works great with the white pants. Just like the white/cardinal/whites at #6, however, these were one step away from perfect. Where those needed to remove a color, these need to add one.
Both the jerseys and pants incorporate cardinal, black, and white elements. However, the helmet lacks the cardinal to fully bring the look together.
#3 – Southern Miss (19-49-1, last used in 2024)
Two games before it was used in the IS4S Salute to Veterans Bowl, the Stormtrooper look made its first appearance of the season against Southern Miss. This exact setup is the best version of the Stormtrooper Troy has used. The decal set perfectly echoes the numbers, wordmark, and the pants stripes. Cardinal and black leap off of the white canvas they were placed on.
While the uniform itself was great, I truly wished, since Southern Miss came out in black/gold/gold, that Troy came out in all cardinal and played the Condiment Bowl 2.0 (also known as the Hot Dog Game).
Editor’s Note: Given the result of that game, it’s not considered a missed opportunity by the entire Trojan Wall staff.
#2 – JMU (1-4, last used in 2023)
These next two might be controversial, not for the uniform itself, but for my thoughts about them. While the uniform universe has been quite wild in the variety and amount of uniforms, (and I have enjoyed most of them), I do feel like there is going to be a return to the more conservative elements in the equipment room.
What I mean is that as costs increase, schools might begin to reduce them by spending less on uniforms and going back to a standard home and away set.
Middle Tennessee added nearly $700,000 to their NIL budget by doing just this in 2025. I mean, they still went 3-9, but that was an early investment and I’d say that 2026 and 2027 are the real barometers of whether or not this worked.
All that to say this, if Troy were to follow this trend, this version of the white/white/cardinal should be the away uniform. It creates a much simpler and cohesive look. It also reduces the colorway in such a fashion that easily identifies cardinal as Troy’s primary color in much the same way that they 2004-2014 uniforms did.
The biggest negative with this set is its record. The only win (in the modern era, at least) came against Texas State in 2021.
#1 – Arkansas State (20-9 since 2000, last used in 2024)
The perfect inverse of the aways, cardinal/cardinal/white should be Troy’s standard home set (even if it didn’t return to traditional home/away sets). It looks so good and classic, especially since for many years, this was the home set.
As with the away version, I love the simplicity of the look and how it highlights all of the things that make Troy’s uniforms look great. It also heightens the focus on Cardinal as our primary color.
Two personal preference issues do creep up with this one though. Firstly, if you have paid any attention to my thoughts on Troy’s uniforms, you know that I love the Troy script. I completely get that some think it works for baseball, so these two work out great for using the Power T as well.
Secondly, by focusing on just cardinal and white, Troy again abandons black as an accent color. That might not be an issue for some fans, but it would be something I would have difficulty with, since it’s been such a part of the recent (as well as distant) past.
That wraps up the 2025 Troy Football season and now we begin to look forward to the 2026 campaign. As always, let me know your thoughts in the comments or on Twitter @BenOnSports.