Five years after adopting the moniker — which never caught on and was lampooned by Saturday Night Live — the University of Arizona will no longer refer to itself as “UArizona.”
The change was quietly announced in a small note in the written style guide on the U of A website.
“Please note: as of 7/1/24, ‘UArizona’ is officially retired and should no longer be used except in pre-existing instances or social media handles,” the style guide reads.
The university’s X, formerly Twitter, profile is still called @UArizona.
The style guide note announcing the change was included within a larger section on how university officials should refer to the UA. It says acceptable nicknames for the university include “U of A” and “Arizona.”
The university first started pushing to be called “UArizona” in fall 2019.
“We are adopting the use of ‘UArizona’ to distinguish the University of Arizona from several other national and international entities that use the abbreviation UA, which will assist us with search engine optimization,” UA Associate Vice President for External Communications Pam Scott wrote in email communications at the time.
Saturday Night Live poked fun at the time.
“Is it just me, or does the ‘UArizona’ sound like the punchline to a joke about Arizona stereotypes?” Colin Jost quipped on the show’s Weekend Update segment. “Like, ‘If you ever got a DUI in a golf cart, you Arizona.’”
UA spokesperson Mitch Zak echoed Scott’s 2019 email in his statement to the Star on Wednesday.
“In 2019, UArizona was added to replace UA as a second reference in our written style guide for communications purposes and to optimize online searches for the university,” he said. “We’re best known to students, alums and fans as Arizona and the U of A.”
“The University of Arizona was never rebranded,” he said. “UArizona was never intended to brand the university.”
The Star never adopted the UArizona usage, and continued to refer to the U of A or UA.
A number of Tucsonans flocked to X to rejoice that the name has been retired. “Never wrote or said UArizona once,” wrote X user @AndyMorales8, for example. “The Arizona fans knew, and know, that’s nuts and not reader friendly.”
John D’Anna is one of three generations in his family to graduate from the U of A. He had sharp words about the “UArizona” moniker.
“It was contrived, inorganic and just plain stupid, so it’s no surprise it didn’t stick,” D’Anna, a journalist, told the Star Wednesday.
Jason Scheer, senior editor of the Wildcat Authority sports blog, is a UA alum who said the move to UArizona “was ignored for the most part.”
“It’s always been U of A,” he said to the Star. “It just didn’t feel natural to change it. People got accustomed to calling it U of A or even UA.”
Scheer added that the 2019 change felt “forced on people.”
As for the potential confusion with other U of A’s, like the University of Alabama?
“I’ve been here for 20 years,” Scheer said. “I know there are other U of As around the country but to me when someone says U of A it’s just Arizona.”
Get your morning recap of today's local news and read the full stories here: tucne.ws/morning
