From Converse to sweat bands, basketball uniforms have changed a lot over the years. Basketball players no longer feel the need to wear knee pads to protect themselves from the court, their uniforms are looser, allowing for better mobility, and they’ve cut their hair so that they can actually see where they’re going. It’s hard to think that it hasn’t always been the comfortable, breathable uniforms athletes wear today and that outrageously short shorts were once the norm, but it’s true.

“[The shorts] were more like track shorts than current basketball shorts,” Wenatchee High School Principal, and former player for Shadle Park High School, Eric Anderson said. “[The uniforms] were tighter, they were shorter shorts. The newer uniforms are much more comfortable to wear.”

Comfort has become an important aspect of what an athlete wears to perform in, and advancements in knowledge about clothes has helped to accomplish this. Technology nowadays makes sure that our athletes aren’t wearing anything other than the top-of-the-market clothes. The socks are shorter, shoes are lighter and more comfortable, and the jerseys allow air-flow to keep the athlete cool and comfortable.

“I wore Reeboks more than anything when Reeboks had the pump,” Anderson said. “Shoes were a whole lot heavier when I was playing basketball. The technology has really made the shoes a lot lighter than they were.”

Not only are the uniforms getting lighter and more comfortable, but they’re also becoming safer for the athlete as well. Although it’s a non-contact sport, players still get bumped and bruised quite often. Some wear compression sleeves to help keep their muscles from tightening up during a game. This revolution, along with others such as protective padding, are all geared towards keeping the players safe.

“My ninth grade of high school was kind of the last year of — shall we call — the “short short uniforms,” Anderson said. “Realistically, even when I played AAU in middle school and then the rest of my high school experience, [the uniforms] were kind of your normal length, longer shorts that they’re wearing right now, but ninth grade was the year, where we had old jerseys, and they were pretty short. They were more like track shorts than current basketball shorts.

“Technology obviously plays into so much of this. If you look at the new Nike jerseys and those kinds of things, they’re made with so much ability for air flow through them,” said Anderson. “When you’re talking about body temperature and everything else and trying to stay cool or hydrated, it’s just interesting the new technologies that goes into our uniforms in terms of breathability and allowing air in and all of that kind of stuff. You see the new kind of basketball jerseys with the backs that are something like “mesh” that allows a whole lot of air flow through the uniform.”