NHL logo rankings No. 30: Carolina Hurricanes

This summer, THN ranked all 30 NHL logos and will count down from 30 to 1. As we do, we're reaching out to our readers to redesign each one. At the bottom of our rankings are the Carolina Hurricanes - think you can come up with a better look?

The Carolina Hurricanes logo is the first one to get rolled out in our 2014 summer logo rankings – unfortunately for them, we’re counting down from worst to first. Yes, the Hurricanes have a terrible logo, one that was almost unanimously voted No. 30 by a group of seven THN staffers. It’s most commonly referred to as the Toilet Bowl logo because, well, it looks like it's being flushed. Carolina’s logo is, of course, based on the swirling system of a hurricane. Maybe it’s just difficult to come up with a logo based on weather. The
Guelph Storm logo would rank low on our Ontario League list, as would the
Cincinnati Cyclones in an ECHL ranking. What else can you do with a Hurricanes logo? Well that’s up to you. As part of our NHL logo ranking, we’re opening it up to you the reader to get creative and re-design each NHL logo, or just the teams that interest you. Each day that we unveil a new logo in our ranking, that team’s redesign contest will open. At the conclusion of our top 30 rankings, we will reveal the best logo redesigns across the NHL. Think you can do a better job with Carolina's logo? Well here’s your chance. Send us a completely new design (even change the color scheme to Hartford green if you want) and we’ll display the best. Let those creative juices flow and see if you can make the cut! Send all entries to editorial@thehockeynews.com (All logos below are from
Chris Creamer's website)
HISTORY OF THE HURRICANES LOGO The Hurricanes franchise didn’t start in Carolina, of course, or even in the NHL. The origins of this team can be found with the WHA’s New England Whalers, who started out in 1972-73. They became the first WHA champions that season and were one of the better franchises until the NHL merger in 1979.

The Whalers were part of the NHL-WHA merger with a condition that they had to drop New England from their name. So, out went New England and the old WHA logo and in came Hartford and a brand new and very clever Whalers logo. The 'W' remained to keep a connection to the team's past, but a whale tail was introduced. The combination of the two formed a not instantly noticeable 'H' for Hartford in the white space. This is the logo we look back on with fondness and hold out hope that one day, no matter how long the odds, maybe the Whale will return to NHL ice.
This logo would eventually be darkened in the Whalers' later days, filling the white space in with grey. This was the last of the Whalers logos before Hartford went dark and the team picked up and left for sunny Carolina in 1998.
In Carolina, the whole color scheme changed and the renaming of the franchise led to a clean break away from the Whalers past. The Hurricanes decided to go with a bird's eye view of a hurricane, which looks like an eye to some and a toilet flushing to others. This franchise once had a great logo that would surely have ranked high on our list. Instead, the Hurricanes have given us the 30th-ranked logo in the 30-team NHL. What have you done, Carolina?

Dissenting opinion: "At least you know the logo is the eye of a Hurricane. What the heck is a Capital? It's just letters. And where is the Blue Jacket in the Blue Jackets logo?"
- Matt Larkin Once again, feel free to completely redesign this logo and send your submissions to editorial@thehockeynews.com. We'll pick the best and run them online in late-August, after our countdown of the 30 NHL logos concludes. In the meantime, which Whalers/Hurricanes logo do you like best?

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