MaxPreps Mascot Mondays: Oregon high school mascots

Just as important as a school's name and its location is its mascot. Options abound, and some teams go with the commonplace while others go with the truly unique.

In Oregon, there are 284 schools with mascots listed in the MaxPreps database. Listed below are the Top 15 most popular mascot names in Oregon, the mascot names that only one school owns and other mascot facts/stats.

AARDVARKS COME IN FIRST
Mascot names with an apostrophe are excluded from this statement: The Oregon Episcopal (Portland) Aardvarks top the list of American mascots when put in alphabetical order. That's right, the Aardvarks stand alone. Word has it that the school used to be Falcons, but the students voted on the Aardvark to replace it. The Aardvark is a strange-looking mammal native to Africa that features a long snout, and is often confused with the anteater, and it's completely unique to Oregon Episcopal.

BEARS FROM LAVA: DOUBLE SCARY
Bend has a double-scary mascot name: Lava Bears. You've got the ferocity of bears, and the hot deadliness of lava. While doubling up on scariness is awesome, it wasn't the intent for Bend. The town is located near the Horse Lava Tube System, a series of lava tubes that formed when basaltic lava cooled and hardened, leaving space underneath for thinner lava to keep flowing through. There are plenty of Bears in America, but Bend, Ore. is the only place to find Lava Bears.

MADRAS IS 1 IN 10 MILLION
Madras (Ore.) isn't the only school in American to choose the buffalo, or bison, as its namesake. What makes Madras unique is that it went with the White Buffaloes, and that makes this a completely different story. The white buffalo is considered to be sacred in many Native American cultures and is a very rare find, as most buffalo are brown. The National Bison Association has said that white buffalo are extremely rare, with one in about 10 million being born white. They are just as rare when it comes to American high school mascots: Madras is the only one.

REDSIDES WITH NO RED SIDES
The Redband Trout is known as the Redside, and it's a very unique type of Rainbow Trout that is native to the Deschutes River. South Wasco County (Maupin) rests just blocks from the Deschutes, and it pays homage to the fish with its Redsides mascot name. But it doesn't do so with its school colors or uniforms, as there are no red sides on the green and gold format of the team uniforms. Oregon is a place full of rivers for fly fishing, and schools like South Wasco County pay tribute to the most popular wildlife in their area.

ROBBING THE RICH, GIVING TO THE POOR
The Merry Men of Sherwood are responsible for Sherwood changing its mascot name to the Bowmen. According to the football program's website, Robin Hood and his Merry Men were a group of locals (mostly World War II vets) who did community service and gathered for fun. Their efforts made them sort of ambassadors for the town, and they laid the foundation for the Robin Hood Festival. The school joined in with the theme in 1953, changing from Bulldogs to Bowmen. It is the only Bowmen school in the nation.

TOP 15 MOST POPULAR MASCOT NAMES
# Eagles 18
# Tigers 13 (There is 1 Tiger Scots)
# Cougars 12
# Warriors 11
# Bulldogs 10
# Lions 8
# Panthers 8 (There is 1 Black Panthers)
Pirates 7
# Vikings 7
# Mustangs 6
Loggers 5
# Falcons 5
Spartans 5
# Knights 5
Huskies 5
# Denotes mascot name is in America's Top 15

MASCOT NAMES USED BY ONLY 1 SCHOOL

*Aardvarks Antelopes Antlers Apollos *Axemen Badgers Bears Beavers Billies Black Panthers *Black Tornado Blue Devils Bluejays Blues Boomers *Bowmen Bulls Cavemen Celtics Challengers

Cheesemakers Chieftains Cobras Colts *Columbians Comets Crimson Tide Cruisers Cubs Democrats Devils Elks Fishermen Foxes Generals Gladiators Gophers Greyhounds Heat Highlanders

Hilanders Jaguars Kingsmen *Lava Bears Leopards Locomotives Mavericks Millers Monarchs Navigators Oakers Olympians Pacers Pelicans Pilots Prospectors Quakers Rebels Red Devils Red Tail Hawks

*Redsides Roadrunners Rockets Roughriders Royals Sailors Savages Saxons Seagulls Senators Skyhawks Storm *Techmen *Tiger Scots Titans Valiants Watchmen *White Buffaloes Wolves

* Denotes that no other school in America has that mascot name

MASCOT STATS
Most popular mascot name is used by 6.3 percent of schools.
There are 124 different mascot names for 284 schools.
10 schools have mascot names that no other American school has.
Oregon's Top 15 features 11 of America's Top 15 mascot names.