Best high school mascot in Oregon: Top 10 candidates

From Lava Bears to Cruisers to Redsides, meet the best high school mascots in Oregon

What happens when a Lava Bear makes like hungry Fishermen and eats too many Redsides?

A Black Tornado forms in the belly, leaving the Lava Bear wishing it had the diet of Aardvarks or Billies.

SBLive Sports' love for unique mascots with interesting back stories has been well documented.

We've crowned Hodags and Imps the past couple of years in national high school mascot contests, and now we're taking a spin through every state.

Over the next couple of months we'll go from Alabama through Wyoming featuring each state's best high school mascots, and then give readers a chance to vote for their favorite. Our Oregon poll posted Nov. 16 on highschool.si.com and will stay open through Nov. 23:

Vote: Which is the best high school mascot in Oregon?

Here are the top 10 high school mascots in Oregon:

Astoria Fishermen

There’s been some debate in the past about changing Astoria’s mascot to something more gender-neutral, but it remains the Fishermen with one explanation being that in the industry, “fishermen” is used universally regardless of gender. Located where the Columbia River meets the Pacific Ocean, fishing is a huge part of the Astoria community. Way bigger than the Goonies.

Bend Lava Bears

A bear dripping with lava? Not quite. The lava bear is a legendary variety of black bear found in the lava beds of south central Oregon. The few “lava bears” that were killed or captured were a little larger than a badger. Today, it is acknowledged that lava bears never existed as a unique species. So although Small Bears would be more accurate, Lava Bears sounds way cooler.

Benson Techsters/Astronauts

Benson is going from one one-of-a-kind mascot among U.S. high schools to another. Per students’ request, the nickname is switching from Techsters to Astronauts in 2024, so the technical school will still have a mascot all to itself. No other high school in the country calls itself the Astronauts (though there is an Astronaut High School in Florida that calls itself the War Eagles).

Bonanza Antlers

One surefire way to become inclusive of all antlered species is to just call yourself the Antlers rather than the Moose, Elks, Antelopes, Angoras, etc.

Huntington Locomotives

The railroad had a huge impact on the small Eastern Oregon town of Huntington being established in the late 1800s, so the high school went with Locomotives as its mascot. The Locomotives were an 8-man football juggernaut in the late ‘60s and early ‘70s, chugging past the competition to win four straight state titles.

North Medford Black Tornado

Not only does North Medford have the only Black Tornado in the country among U.S. high schools, it has a fantastic back story. In the 1928 state championship football game, well before Medford split into North and South, a sports editor described the Medford team’s dominance of Benson as sweeping over the field “like a Black Tornado.” Black Tornado officially became the school mascot in 1953, and North Medford kept it when the school split in 1986, with South Medford becoming the Panthers. 

Oregon Episcopal Aardvarks

Oregon Episcopal has been Eagles and Falcons in the past, but students rightly brought in something a little more unique when switching to the Aardvarks. The story goes that students started calling themselves the Aardvarks in the 1960s and ‘70s despite the official name being the Falcons, and Aardvarks eventually officially stuck in the late ‘80s.

Pleasant Hill Billies

Four high schools in the U.S. call themselves the Hillbillies and three others are the Billies, but none are more pleasant than this one. And Pleasant Hill’s billy goat logo is very pleasant to look at.

Powers Cruisers

Nope, these Cruisers weren’t named in the late 1950s or early 1960s in honor of teenagers driving their cars around trying to find a new place where the kids were hip. Powers is in timber country near the southern Oregon coast, and a timber cruiser is someone who estimates the value of timber in a particular forest.

South Wasco Redsides

We already met the Cutthroat in Idaho, and now we have the Redsides, another form of trout. Also called a Redband trout, a Redside is named for the red stripe along its side. South Wasco High School is located a stone’s throw away from the Deschutes River, which is loaded with Redsides.

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-- Mike Swanson | swanson@scorebooklive.com | @sblivesports