What’s wrong with having a polar bear as a mascot?
^Yeah, Bowdoin wants to know, too. At least there are polar bears in Alaska.
U of South Carolina has Cocky the Gamecock, a very unthreatening red bird. The logo version looks kind of like a pig with wings. Good thing is that once you sit through orientation (which parents attend with students) and hear, “Gooooo Cocks!” about 100 times, the double entendre ceases to exist (although my D knows better than to wear her Cocks baseball cap–no logo, just the word Cocks all in caps–around her grandparents.
Re: Fairbanks: No problem, really—and it’s the sanest of the three, by far—I just figured it might feel left out if I only mentioned the other two. 
(FWIW, it makes even more sense if you recognize that Nanook is an anglicization of the Iñupiaq word for polar bear.)
^^ Ok apparently the vulgarity filter caught my post which proves that the nickname is vaguely scandalous.
^^ Even weirder, the post with the not to be posted nickname just earned me CC member status!
@dfbdfb, I’m a UAF alum. At first I thought “Nanooks” was a weird name, but after awhile came to like (not love) it for its uniqueness. Better than UAF Snowballs or UAF Oosiks.
Southern Arkansas University Tech – the Varmints.
I’m sure the vulgarity filter is why post #8, for Rhode Island School of Design, doesn’t actually mention the mascot!
Other unusual mascots:
Evergreen State: Geoducks (the geoduck is the world’s largest burrowing clam)
University of North Carolina School of the Arts: the Fighting Pickle
Concordia College (MN): Kernel Cobb
Mary Baldwin: Gladys the Fighting Squirrel
Washburn University: the Ichabods
Up until now, students at Whitman College have been formally known as the Missionaries (and informally as the Fighting Missionaries). Note, the school has had no religious affiliation for most of its history, despite being named after the Christian missionaries Marcus and Narcissa Whitman. The new president just announced that the mascot was “considered noninclusive, imperialistic and incorrectly implied that Whitman was a religious school.”
Students are also changing the name of the school newspaper, long known as the “Pioneer.”
New names have not yet been chosen.
In real life, students just refer to themselves as Whitties.
Has to be the RISD “unofficial” mascot (Scrotie).
For Whitman, how about Samplers?
I think someone mentioned this before, but Delta State’s team name is the Fighting Okra! (I think it’s an intentional joke, though.)
The Minnesota Golden Gophers is pretty funny to me.
Can we talk about the Syracuse Orange? Now, I understand the history of the name and why it was revised, but really they would’ve been better off changing to something completely different. A school in NY having an orange for a mascot is just stupid.
Rhode Island School of Design . . .
How about the Marlboro College Fighting Dead Trees?
How did they NOT choose these names:
Brown…Nosers
Rice…Pilafs
Morehead …Aches
Northwestern …Passages
Hamilton…Blenders
Tulane …Roads
Duke…Ellingtons
I don’t think their mascot is actually an Orange. Yes, they may have a guy dress up like an orange, but they’re known as the “Orange”. Like the Crimson Tide.
Yes, I understand, but the mascot IS the guy dressed up like an orange. The team name is “The Orange”, but the mascot is an orange-costumed person.
Not so much bad as unusual (although it turned my daughter off during a tour) - the UC Irvine anteaters.
Syracuse’s mascot is Otto the Orange.
@moooop - your post was hysterical!