ClapMinnesota Stars FC. That’s the new name of the former NSC Minnesota Stars. Both CEO Djorn Buchholz and player assistant coach Kevin Friedland, who also does some promotional work with the team, said the NSC name on the logo was confusing.
“It’s not something we looked at and said, this has got to change. It sort of developed,” said Friedland. The Stars defender told a story of traveling through airports during the season and people would ask the team what NSC was. “Not even all our new players could explain that,” said Friedland. “We’d tell them we are the National Sports Center and people still wouldn’t get it. They answer, what’s a National Sports Center team? So we’d tell them we’re the Stars. There was a lot of confusion and we wanted to get rid of that confusion.”
“We’ve been working on this for a good 6 months,” said Kevin Joseph, designer of the Stars’ new team logo. “It started by sending in some ideas to Kevin Friedland after an off-hand conversation with Alex (Haueter, Media Relations for the Stars).”
Joseph, who works in graphic design and is a member of the Dark Clouds supporters group, explained, “The main elements are of course the star which was there before. But we wanted to add the name to the logo. We wanted to make it a focal point of what this logo is all about. So the team can go to the airport and people will recognize the logo and the team can be proud of it and say we’re the Minnesota Stars! We’re the 2011 NASL Champions.”
Another feature of the new logo is the inclusion of the Minnesota State Motto: L’Etoile du Nord.The Star of the North. “It was a big deal for us to connect more with Minnesota. We are Minnesota’s team!” said Joseph.
While answering questions Joseph explained that the light blue image behind the star is a indeed a soccer ball.
The logo was revealed in a Brave New Media film created with for the logo launch. The film featured footage of the Stars’ Championship home leg and a 3D rendering of the logo with an independent star above the shield to declare their 2011 NASL Championship.
The old NSC Minnesota Stars logo.
Brave New Media, a digital media company from Minneapolis, committed themselves last season to helping the Stars find a new owner. Since then, they have been spreading the gospel of the Stars through many feature films they have created about Minnesota’s soccer team and their championship season.
The team also announced that their website will have a new address but the old URL will still get you to the correct place. Twitter will also be changing but in name only and it will be the same account. However, Facebook was more complicated so you will need to find the team’s new Facebook page here and “Like” it.
Manny Lagos also took the stage before the logo reveal and stated that the team invited 5 of the local players from Friday’s combine to train with the team the next several weeks.
He also said that the team will have their first ever combine out of state which will take place in Arizona. Lagos said it was important to give some young players from the Southwest a look whom may not travel to try out in Minnesota. “We know we have to find creative way to make our team better,” said Lagos. He said the announcement of the combine will be made on Tuesday morning.
Djorn Buchholz took the stage to announce some details on the Stars’ home opener against the regular league season champions, the Carolina RailHawks, which will be played in the Metrodome on April 7th. Buchholz said general admission tickets will only be $5.00. Reserve tickets in the middle will be $10.00. “That’s cheap,” said Buchholz. “And we did that on purpose.” The Stars CEO says there will be 17,000 seats available and he wants to fill all of them. “People complain that the NSC Stadium is too far north. Well, here’s your chance. It’s on the light rail, it’s downtown. Let’s make this happen!”
