UCF's, Air Force's space-themed threads lead best uniforms of Week 9 in college football

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  ESPN staffOct 30, 2026, 09:00 AM ET

Fresh off one of the season's biggest upsets last Saturday, UCF is keeping the good vibes around Orlando rolling in Week 9 -- through the use of uniforms.

Once a year for the past decade, the Golden Knights have marked one of their home games as the season's "Space Game," a special event where the school pays homage to its connection to the spacefaring industry. UCF is a longtime partner with NASA, whose Kennedy Space Center is just a 45-minute drive from the Golden Knights' stadium.

This year's "Mission X" uniforms are another strong entry into the annual alternate uniform series.

The uniforms have a base white color, with a clean light blue and red trim accenting the jersey, pants and helmets. The look -- which is based upon the 1960s NASA -- contains a number of notable details paying tribute to three foundational programs of that decade: Project Mercury, Project Gemini and the Apollo Program.

The Golden Knights aren't the only squad bringing the heat with their uniforms this week. In fact, they're not even the only team going with space-themed uniforms. Here are the top threads from Week 9 in college football.

Air Force

Also going the space route with its uniforms this Saturday? Air Force, which has broken out its own space-themed alternates. The alternate look actually eschews the academy program's traditional name on the jersey nameplate, instead honoring the Space Force. Replacing player names on the back of the all-black threads are the words "Semper Supra" -- which is Latin for "always above" -- a nod to the Space Force's official march.

Navy

Navy will face a major task in taking down a highly ranked Notre Dame squad Saturday, but the Midshipmen will have one trick up their sleeve to provide some extra swagger: a special set of uniforms. The Mids will be donning a throwback blue-and-gold set with old-school-style block numbers and patterns.

Nebraska

With a majority of this weekend's games coming on Halloween, a number of teams are following a similar theme with their uniform look: all-black threads. Of the assorted black-on-black looks, Nebraska's stands out as particularly notable, a stark contrast from the Cornhuskers' classic red and white color scheme. Red is present on the uniform, though, with a deeper, metallic shade on the uniform's numbers, wordmarks and helmet stripe.

UNLV

UNLV is also going the all-black-for-Halloween route and will sport a red-and-black heavy styling that strikes a similar tenor to those of the Cornhuskers. The biggest difference in the Rebels' look comes in the helmets -- a bold, red wordmark-and-base number will contrast the uniform's black jersey and pants.

Arizona State

Another team playing up the spooky Saturday vibes with a new piece of black gear is Arizona State, who won't be going all-black -- pairing a white jersey with black pants -- but will be debuting a new helmet fit for the holiday. The Sun Devils will be rocking a lid featuring their mascot Sparky, the first time they've worn a helmet featuring such a design on a black base.

Syracuse

One of the best alternate helmets of the week comes from upstate New York, where Syracuse is rocking some iconic lids for its showdown with SMU. The Orange have one of the most recognizable mascots in sports -- Otto, an anthropomorphic orange, who will be making his helmet debut on a white set of lids Saturday.

Tulane

Speaking of anthropomorphic mascots appearing on helmets, Tulane is also breaking out a lid with a similar theme. The Green Wave are rolling with their "wumbo" helmets on Friday night, which feature the school's growling wave emblem cresting across a white helmet, eyes narrowed toward the face mask and all.

WUMBO is BACK #UptownFootball https://t.co/PLt9Sq4AoP

— Tulane Football (@GreenWaveFB) October 28, 2026