EAST HARTFORD, Conn. — Beyond the players and coaches, no individual associated with UConn football is more recognizable than the man who paints himself blue and white and has never missed a home game since Rentschler Field opened in 2003.
What is the story behind the super fan who religiously roams the student section, having earned the respect of multiple generations of UConn fans? Who exactly is the man underneath the paint?
Meet Dale Nosel, the Huskies fanatic who, in addition to his home attendance streak, has also made his way painted to every UConn football road game for 15 consecutive years.
Nosel, who grew up in Wallingford, took an unexpected path to becoming the UConn legend that he is today. The 39-year-old is a 2007 graduate of UConn, but his infatuation with all things Huskies has been a lifelong affair.
Nosel lives for the kickoff and feels most at home on game day, when he never sits down or wears a jacket. He’s been at it for more than two decades and has no plans of stopping soon.
“I’ve had people tell me my personality shifts a little bit when I put on the paint…game day intensity, you kind of flip the switch in a way,” Nosel said. “I want to do it until I can’t. When I’m in the ground, I’m probably not going to be painted, so I guess I’ll stop then.”
The origins
Born in Bridgeport, Nosel moved to Wallingford when he was two years old. As a teenager, he attended Mark T. Sheehan High School. That’s where he began his body painting endeavors.
Nosel recalls painting his body “half-and-half” with his school’s colors of burgundy and gold and attending both football and basketball games. He even painted himself for the girls’ powder puff game.
Going to college, however, was far from his mind. Nosel is half Puerto Rican and frequented the U.S. territory as a youth. Nosel said he developed a fascination with piraguas, a Puerto Rican dessert shaped like a cone that is made of shaved ice and covered with fruit-flavored syrup.
A teenage Nosel had his mind set on becoming a piraguas vendor who would travel throughout the country selling frozen treats.
“I was going to build a cart, sell them in New York City in the summer and then go down to Miami and sell them in the winter,” Nosel said. “So, junior or senior year of high school, I was not as motivated academically as I had been prior. It was, ‘I don’t really want to go to college, I just want to go sell snow cones,’ do my thing, figure out life.”
Fortunately, Nosel’s parents asked his coaches and teachers for letters of recommendation and used an essay he wrote in English class to apply to colleges. Nosel was unaware, so he was quite surprised when he received an acceptance letter to UConn. He didn’t complain though because growing up, he was always a big UConn sports fan.
Birth of the ‘Blue and White Guy’
While Nosel was naturally drawn to UConn athletics, the classroom was a bit more of a challenge. It took great effort to stay academically focused. Fortunately, attending UConn sports games of all kinds would be his saving grace.
Nosel was a freshman when Rentschler Field opened in 2003; he was there as UConn demolished Indiana. Nosel said it wasn’t at that first game but recalled it was early in the season when he first shaved his head and painted himself half blue and half white.
Ahead of UConn basketball’s First Night festivities that fall, Nosel’s roommate, a manager on the men’s basketball team, spoke to him about being the biggest Huskies fan there is on campus.
The roommate, who is now a head coach in the NBA, showed Nosel newspaper clippings with pictures of enthusiastic UConn fans. He said Nosel wouldn’t do what it takes to be the biggest UConn fan out of all of them.
“Whatever that conversation was, there was a ‘You won’t do it,’ and it led me to wearing full body paint, just wearing at that time basketball shorts. [My roommate] went on to be the head coach of the Oklahoma City Thunder right now, Mark Daigneault…I still paint my face and go to football games,” Nosel said with a grin.
Just like that, a star was born. When painted blue and white, Nosel became one of the most distinguishable students on campus, and he made an effort to attend all sports from field hockey to volleyball.
Nosel has fond memories of electrifying the student section at football and basketball games, sometimes to the point where it was so loud that opposing teams had difficulty communicating plays or running offense.
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“I wanted to support the teams and have an impact on the game in some way,” Nosel said. “I don’t know if me as an individual has had an impact, but I know that fans can definitely have an impact… There’s been times where I can get more people fired up, get more people into games.”
During his time as a student, UConn men’s and women’s basketball each won a national championship in 2004. He also watched the football program firmly establish itself as a perennial contender in the Big East.
Nosel reflected on how attending UConn games allowed him to complete his four years of college.
“Sometime [later], my dad was like, ‘Yeah, I know we wouldn’t have been able to motivate you to stay for all four years if you weren’t going to the games and doing what you were doing.’ That was my way of staying connected and pushing through,” Nosel said.
Nosel ultimately graduated in 2007 after majoring in communication science and minoring in psychology. Was his time as the Blue and White Guy over? Not by a long shot.
Post-graduation fanhood and the process
Following his graduation, Nosel remained in Wallingford, an easy drive from UConn’s campus in Storrs and football stadium in East Hartford. When the football season rolled around, Nosel knew only one routine, and he stuck to it. He explained why he kept painting himself blue and white as he ventured further into adulthood.
“I don’t know, I guess I see in life a lot of people and a lot of things, they just feel like you graduate, you stop, or once you’re this age you can’t do this anymore or this type of thing,” Nosel said. “When I graduated, I didn’t think, ‘Hey, should I stop doing this?’ It was, ‘Hey, I like doing this, I can still do this,’ so I’m going to continue doing this.”
As he continues his mission to support the UConn football team in person both home and away, Nosel follows a strict routine, although he jokes that he has gotten lazy and slow with it over the years.
On game days, Nosel wakes up about three hours before he leaves the house and goes on a two-mile run. He comes back, shaves his arms and head and showers before eating breakfast.
“Then, the actual paint application part of it is about 40 minutes. Usually, just in the mirror, do that myself. People always ask how do you get the lines so straight, and it’s just practice, hand-eye-coordination type stuff,” Nosel said.
According to Nosel, he paints his head white first, then paints one arm blue, paints the other arm and hand white and then paints the last hand blue. He is careful not to mix the blue and the white when finishing his head.
To complete the process, Nosel always puts on a No. 6 shirt in honor of Jasper Howard, a star Huskies football player who was murdered after a standout game in 2009. The shirt Nosel wears is one of those originally handed out at UConn football’s first home game after Howard’s passing.
When Nosel first started the game day tradition, he used oil-based paint, which didn’t come off well. He joked there were many long showers and says he has since transitioned to a water-based product he buys in bulk.
Cheering for the Huskies is his favorite past time, and while Nosel is a bonafide star in UConn Nation, he prefers not to draw the spotlight if possible.
“I’d rather not get a whole lot of attention in a way at this point,” he said. “It’s what I do, showing dedication. I’ve had my time, my shine, or whatever. I’m not doing it to say, ‘Look at me.’”
Earlier this year, Nosel married his wife, Bridget. He welcomes the possibility of starting a family sometime soon. In his head, Nosel says he wants to continue attending games wearing paint even after he has children but acknowledges that things could change if certain opportunities open or he gets tired of the process.
People have asked Nosel if his wife will start wearing paint and attending football games, but he says there’s no need for her to do that. If his children wish to follow in his footsteps, he will be all for it, but he won’t force the tradition on them.
“I don’t want to be that parent,” Nosel said. “Just because I did it, I’m not going to push [it on them]. If they ever wanted to, I’ll be like, ‘Sure, have a blast,’ but that’s not going to be a, ‘Hey, you’re my kid so you have to do what I did.’”
Meet Dale Nosel, the teacher
The story of Dale Nosel begs the question, what does he do today?
Nosel, an avid runner and running coach, is currently employed at Plainville High School teaching physical education and health. He delved into why he entered the world of education and what it means to him.
“It’s having the opportunity to impact young people; to hopefully put them on a good path going forward so they can live healthy, active lives,” Nosel said.
While Nosel doesn’t announce on the first day of school that he is the Blue and White Guy, he says most students know or find out.
“It’s not something I try to hide,” Nosel said.
Nosel says that some students call him a celebrity, but he doesn’t feel like one. He’s just a man who has been doing what he loves for 21 years.
Last October, following UConn football’s heartbreaking loss to South Florida, Nosel traveled back to Plainville to DJ the school’s homecoming dance. He didn’t have time to remove the paint.
“[UConn] lost right at the very end, tough loss; I drove there, showed up to homecoming totally painted,” Nosel said. “I had told administration that was going to happen, and they were cool with it. Some people were like, ‘Oh my God, he’s painted,’ and other people were like, ‘Oh, that’s Mr. Nosel. It’s normal.’ It was a different night.”
So, next time Huskies fans see the legendary Blue and White Guy at a UConn football game, know he is just a regular guy who is dedicated to supporting his favorite team through thick and thin.
Nosel doesn’t even consider himself the biggest UConn fan in the state – he saves that title for Big Red, another mainstay at UConn sporting events.
Nosel is thankful to everyone who dedicates their time to rooting UConn on. Whether they’re wearing paint or not, Nosel firmly believes that all UConn fans bring something unique to the table.
“I don’t feel like just because I paint my face, I’m a bigger fan than anyone else. Different people have their own ways of supporting the team,” Nosel said. “For some people, it’s through financial backing. Some people are here at every game and have been supporting since the Memorial Stadium days. Just because [some fans] don’t paint their face, they don’t get the notoriety. That doesn’t mean they’re not a big fan.”
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Dalton Zbierski is a digital content producer and writer at FOX61 News. He can be reached at dzbierski@FOX61.com.
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