Photo courtesy of KENS-TV

On Thursday, November 24, a tweet was shared from @Texas_HS_Sports that highlighted a recent New Braunfels ISD board meeting. In said meeting, it was discussed what the mascot name could possibly be for the upcoming Long Creek High School. Turns out, the Unicorns is just too loved in the community to be passed on.

This would mark the second instance an ISD within the state would have schools share the same name. Back in January of 2019, Hutto ISD voted that all future high schools should don the name Hippos.

And while Unicorns and Hippos are fantastic names as mascots when only one school has that moniker, two schools within the same district sharing the same name neuters the uniqueness – especially for unicorns.

Of course unicorns are best known as the mythological horse with the singular long horn on its head. The other known definition of unicorn, especially in sports, is one of one or hard to find. Having two in one ISD and town completely ignores that.

The other issue with the polling that was revealed in the tweet were the colors the majority of those polled chose, which is the exact same blue as the current New Braunfels Unicorns. And with the UIL naming convention, it’s very possible they will be called the New Braunfels Long Creek Unicorns. Of course the short name will be Long Creek Unicorns, but imagine the confusion that could be had by those that do not follow this stuff quite as fervently.

Imagine if all the schools in the larger districts, Dallas, Houston, Fort Worth, Austin, Northside, etc. were all called the same thing – though with the repetitiveness in mascots (e.g. Eagles, Bulldogs) it’s close – it would kill creativity.

Nothing was decided upon in this meeting, which happened a week ago, so we offer some suggestions. Blue is fine, but not the same blue. There were a good number of votes for a different shade of blue and the second most voted on color was gold. Blue and gold work, just not the New Braunfels shade of blue and gold.

Secondly, maybe dragons or lions shouldn’t be it either. In our database, there are 13 schools that call themselves the dragons and 79 (and probably more that we haven’t added yet) that call themselves the lions.

But the mythological theme is strong, stay in that lane and go with Pegasus. No Pegasuses or Pegasi. Just Pegasus, a la Orlando Magic in the NBA.

It keeps with the theme, is a horse but has wings instead of a horn and creates a unique rivalry instead of one team being the “real” Unicorns.

We even have a quick logo concept we pulled and crafted using a quick Google search.

Quick mockup for Long Creek HS mascot; sourced from Pinterest

Outside of the unicorn name and NBISD blue, it takes everything else into account. Mythological creature, shades of blue and even gold.

The good news: The school doesn’t open until the Fall of 2024, so there is plenty of time for the school board to decide.

The bad news: A precedent has already been set to have two schools in the same district/town share mascots.