Above Left: Louie the Laker. Above Right: Luke the Laker. Right: Luke the Laker bobblehead, available in the Bookstore starting Homecoming Weekend.
Named Louie the Laker primarily for the alliteration, the new mascot incorporated interchangeable jerseys for basketball, football and hockey; a head that could turn; removable shoes so he could wear skates to hockey games; and a cooling system to keep the student inside the bulky costume from overheating. Introduced at a big hockey game early in 2006, Louie was a beloved fgure around campus for years...until a fash food in 2015 in the student union building damaged him beyond repair.
“I was so upset when I heard Louie had been destroyed,” Jef recalls. “It felt like a part of my past at Mercyhurst had died.”
A brand-new mascot – the still alliteratively named Luke the Laker – arrived in fall 2015. Staf from the Campus Involvement Center, athletics, marketing, the university archives and others worked together to develop his backstory. Watch the story of his arrival at Mercyhurst at mercyhurst.edu/meet-the-mascot . Luke, an Irish-born fsherman billed as the nephew of the late Louie, made his frst appearance at the home football opener against Bentley in 2015. Since then, he’s appeared everywhere, popping up not only at athletic contests but all over campus as well as at community events like the St. Patrick’s Day Parade.
The students who bring Luke to life are kept secret, and not revealed until a ceremony near the end of each year.
11
Made with FlippingBook - professional solution for displaying marketing and sales documents online