From high school, to college, to the NFL, nearly every team seeks to find forge their identity through a slogan or motto.
Chip Kelly coined Win The Day back in the day at Oregon that caught on like wildfire, Sark had All Gas No Brakes early on at Texas, and a tragedy in PJ Fleck's personal life led him to developing Row The Boat, which has followed him from Western Michigan to Minnesota (following a brief legal dispute over it upon leaving Kalamazoo).
Nearly all these start as an idea, get instilled and adopted, and the best ones often spread outward so it's no surprise when you see a popular one get copied with no credit to where it derived from.
Well that brings us to Tremaine Jackson and his program at Prairie View A&M (FCS).
Jackson, who is entering his second season in charge of the Panthers program and is coming off a 10-4 debut season and 1st place finish in the SWAC after going 30-9 in three seasons at Valdosta State (D-II - GA) including an appearance in the Division II National Title game in 2024, caught wind of his slogan being adopted by a fellow FCS program and immediately took issue with it.
Turns out for good reason too.
South Dakota State (FCS) assistant defensive backs coach Noah Kent took to X to highlight his position group and utilized three hashtags - #Discipline, #Obedience, and #Grit - and touted DOG Mentality in his social media post.
Seems normal, right?
Well, Jackson replied to the post with "Dang coach!! WE're going to need that trademark 💰 !!"
Turns out Jackson, who recently agreed to a new deal including significant raise for both himself and his staff salary pool, filed for a trademark for D.O.G - standing for Discipline, Obedience, and Grit - to be used on apparel embroidery. According to publicly available records, that was filed back in March.
Kent credits SDSU corners coach Marcus McLin (who ironically goes by @CoachBooDOG on X) for the slogan being used by the Jackrabbits. McLin touts the same three-word DOG Mentality acronym Jackson has attempted to trademark in his X bio.
Coach Jackson responded back to Noah to either reach out and we "might be able to work something out," or find something else to use.
I remember when Fleck was able to secure the rights to Row The Boat, so trademarking a slogan isn't uncharted territory in college football, but whether there's legal grounds in this case is something for someone much smarter than me to figure out. Credit coach Jackson for being forward-thinking enough to know what he's got and to pony up to keep other people from using it.
