Wayne State Athletics unveils 100th anniversary football uniforms

The Medal of Honor is the highest award for valor in action against an enemy force which can be bestowed upon an individual serving in the Armed Services of the United States. Only 3,499 Recipients in the Army, Navy, Air Force, Marine Corps and Coast Guard have been awarded this acknowledgement of extraordinary achievement in military service.

"Any time you celebrate a milestone like 100 years, you have a lot of proud moments and accomplishments to reflect upon," said WSU Director of Athletics Rob Fournier.  "However, the more I thought about a century of athletics at WSU, I couldn't help but think of those who have sacrificed so much so that we could have those 100 years.  And I kept coming back to the military.  And so as we celebrate our 100 years, we likewise pay tribute to those who have performed in the most difficult of situations to give us the freedom to play kid's games.  The Medal of Honor is the greatest testament in our country to that sacrifice.  So all our teams will have the name of one of those heroes on their backs, because as we know, they have always had our backs."

There have been 19 double recipients of the Medal of Honor and there are currently 72 living recipients.

Throughout this academic year's celebration of 100 years of WSU athletics dating back to Detroit Junior College in 1918, each of the 18 athletic teams will have an apparel item with patches representing both the WSU 100th anniversary logo as well as the Medal of Honor logo, in addition to the name of a Medal of Honor recipient.  Four hundred twelve (412) Medal of Honor recipient names were selected to represent each branch of the military, including the only female recipient (Mary Walker of the U.S. Army).

Wayne State student-athletes have performed 60,630 hours of community service over the last six years in Metro Detroit with such organizations as Salvation Army Red Kettle, The Children's Center, Woodward Academy, Relay For Life, Red Cross Bone Marrow Drive, Covenant House of Michigan, Make-A-Wish Foundation, DMC Children's Hospital, Gleaners Food Bank and COTS (Coalition on Temporary Shelter) as well as their own initiative of Hashtag Lunch bag event in conjunction with the Hartford Memorial Baptist Church that supported the NSO (Neighborhood Service Organization).  In addition, they have been a part of projects such as Shoes That Fit and the Basic Needs Drive.

Not only do WSU student-athletes give back, they also do very well in the classroom.  For the Winter 2017 semester, a school record 27 student-athletes earned a 4.00 term GPA and the overall cumulative GPA of the nearly 400 student-athletes is 3.214.

SOURCE Wayne State University

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