UConn was just looking to promote its student action for basketball games for the 2019-20 season, but they made a big mistake. The school put together a campaign that began on Wednesday to attract students to the student section of their games and even made what was originally believed to be a new logo.

However, a closer look showed that in promoting the campaign, UConn utilized a slightly altered logo that NC State has previously used. It was pointed out to UConn on social media.

The student section campaign was designed with the idea of “enhancing the campus spirit,” and even had a planning committee to help promote it. But nobody seemed to notice the similarities between the logo UConn picked and the one NC State has used. 

Both logos feature three animals standing near a cliff with the UConn version being Huskies rather than wolves. The text for NC State’s logo just says “NC State Wolfpack,” while text for the UConn version read “The Pack.” UConn’s logo also features some trees inside of a shield.

Once the campaign hit social media and UConn learned of the similarities, they took the logo down and apologized to NC State.

“We committed an unacceptable misstep by using an NC State mark as a centerpiece of this logo,” an athletic department spokesman said. “As soon as the mistake came to light, we removed the logo from all our digital platforms and reached out to NC State to apologize. The apology was accepted in generous fashion by NC State and we will be taking corrective actions internally to ensure something of this nature never happens again.”

According to Dan Brechlin of the Hartford Courant, the logo was drawn up by a UConn undergraduate student. There was originally a press release about the student section, but it has since been removed from the athletic department’s website.

The entire campaign for UConn is an attempt to help attendance at men’s basketball games specifically. They went 16-17 during the 2018-19 season under new coach Dan Hurley. The program had been penalized for the NCAA for numerous violations that were committed under former head coach Kevin Ollie.