Meet Sporting Jax: It's the name for Jacksonville's new men's & women's pro soccer teams
Sporting Jax is one step closer to kickoff.
The JAXUSL ownership group, including former Jaguars Tim Tebow and Fred Taylor, announced Sporting Club Jacksonville as the name of the city's new professional soccer organization and released its club logo and motto during a Tuesday ceremony at WJCT Studios.
JAXUSL unveiled both the Sporting Jax name and its crest: white lettering on a sky blue circle and central shield, with yellow and orange horizontal stripes on the left and right of the circle in a pattern resembling a sunrise.
"Every morning that you see a sunrise," Tebow said, "what can't help but come to your mind is hope, another day, another opportunity."
The name, club officials said, will likely trim to Sporting Jax in most usage.
City officials and area youth players packed the studio for the announcement, which included videos and a live choral performance of "Lift Every Voice and Sing" from the LaVilla School of the Arts.
"To be here and to feel it and to see it, it's different," said Jeremy Alumbaugh, president of the second-level USL Championship, the division in which the Sporting Jax men's squad will compete.
The club plans to use the crest for both of its teams, the men's team in the USL Championship and the women's team in the new USL Super League, in a move believed to be the first of its kind in league history.
For USL Super League president Amanda Vandervort, using the same logo for both the men's and women's teams is "inspiring and impactful."
When those teams do take the field, they'll already have a motto. Sporting Jax also announced its club motto, "Lift Every Voice," a tribute to Jacksonville natives James Weldon Johnson and J. Rosamond Johnson.
The team, which received its United Soccer League franchise in August 2022, is set to begin competition at a still-undetermined point in 2025 or 2026.
"I've seen how sports affects the community here in Jacksonville," said Taylor, who entered the ownership group in November to join Ricky Caplin, Tony Allegretti, Steve Livingstone and former Heisman Trophy quarterback Tebow. "I've seen how the players affect the community, seeing the kids and the smiles on their faces when they go up to players and ask for autographs, photos, different things. It'll be that same sort of feeling with soccer."
WHY SPORTING JAX?
Add Sporting Jax to the list of Jacksonville soccer names, following the defunct Tea Men and Cyclones and the still-active Armada.
Livingstone said that fans surveyed by JAXUSL favored a traditional club name with European echoes. Sporting, a name used by several overseas clubs including Sporting Clube de Portugal (often known as Sporting Lisbon outside Portugal), stood out as an alternative to the English-inspired names like Major League Soccer's Orlando City and Atlanta United.
"The FC's are kind of overused," Livingstone said. "We wanted to be true to what the fans wanted... it was kind of a happy coincidence with the plans that we've got for the facilities."
The Sporting name, Livingstone said, also reflects one other element of the club's goal. In the future, Livingstone said, the team's targeted 15,000-seat stadium could be used for community events as well as other sports like lacrosse, not just soccer.
"We want to be first to develop these facilities and these stadiums for the community, not just for our professional players," Livingstone said.
While the team name is now confirmed, the wait goes on for determining the site of that stadium, though Caplin said that the organization is focusing on two primary sites and hopes to confirm its venue in early 2024.
Livingstone said Sporting Jax still holds hopes of a 2025 kickoff. However, he said the club is also prepared for the possibility of beginning with the women's team in the fall of 2025 — the USL Super League plans to employ a fall-to-spring season — before the men's team begins play in the second-level USL Championship in early 2026.
Whatever the location, Sporting Jax's kickoff could place the club into a head-to-head First Coast soccer competition against the Armada. The Armada last competed in a fully professional league in 2017, but announced plans in November to construct an Eastside stadium and join the third-division MLS Next Pro for the 2025 season.
TIM TEBOW, FRED TAYLOR EAGER FOR FUTURE
While Sporting Jax's primary color may be blue, the presence of Tebow, Taylor and former NCAA champion women's soccer coach Becky Burleigh added a distinct tinge of Gators orange to the proceedings.
The former University of Florida national football champions, with Gator careers separated by a dozen years, reminisced about their past meetings going back to Tebow's Nease High School career and discussed their hopes for Sporting Jax in their first public appearance together since Taylor joined JAXUSL in November.
"When [Caplin] invited me with the opportunity and told me Tim was on board, I was like, 'That's pretty much all I need to hear,'" Taylor said. "So, for me, it's exciting. We've got some work to do, got to get the city on board, obviously, and I think we will be able to."
"It's exciting to do it with these guys and the rest of the team," Tebow said. "It's also just humbling to be a part of something that we believe could bring impact and influence, dreams and goals, and fun and joy and meaning to our community."
Now that the countdown to kickoff is on, when Sporting Jax scores its first goal, will the celebration turn into a Gator chomp? For Tebow, quite possibly.
"Will I do it? Probably," he said. "I can't help it. I feel like it's part of my DNA."
This article originally appeared on Florida Times-Union: Sporting Jax: Jacksonville professional soccer team announces name
