Since the 1991 season, Eastern Michigan University athletic teams have gone by the nickname "Eagles."

The Eagles name was officially adopted on May 22, 1991, when the EMU Board of Regents voted to replace the existing Huron nickname and logo with the new one.

EMU originally went by the nicknames "Normalites" and "Men from Ypsi" and various other titles down through the years before "Hurons" was adopted in 1929.

The "Hurons" first came into being as the result of a contest sponsored by the Men's Union in 1929. On Oct. 31 of that year, a three-person committee, composed of Dr. Clyde Ford, Dr. Elmer Lyman and Professor Bert Peet, selected the name "Hurons" from the many entries in the contest.

The name was submitted by two students, Gretchen Borst and George Hanner. Hanner was working at the Huron Hotel at the time of the contest and was no doubt as much influenced by his place of employment as by the Huron Indian tribe. The runner-up name in that contest was Pioneers.

EMU began investigating the appropriateness of its Huron Indian logo after the Michigan Department of Civil Rights issued a report in October 1988 suggesting that all schools using such logos drop them. The report indicated that the use of Native American names, logos and mascots for athletic teams promoted racial stereotypes. At that time, four colleges, 62 high schools and 33 junior high/middle schools in Michigan used Indian logos or names.

The EMU Board of Regents voted to replace the Huron name with Eagles, taken from three recommendations from a committee charged with supplying a new nickname. The other two final names submitted were Green Hornets and Express.

-1928	1929-1991	1991-1994
1995-2001	2002	2003-Present