The 9 most bizarre March Madness mascots

College mascots, they're usually created to bring joy to the thousands upon thousands who attend games. To both raise school spirit while also putting a smile on the faces of the younger fans in the stadium.

But there are exceptions to every rule ... in the case of the college mascot some of them are weird, others are just straight up terrifying.

With the onset of the NCAA Men's Final Four basketball tournament, it's the perfect time to introduce the ten most bizarre college mascots you'll ever find patrolling a sideline.

The Stanford Tree

Stanford's sports teams are known as "The Cardinal", not the bird, the reddish color the players wear. 

So ... why do they use a horrifying pine tree? Well for one, it's not the official mascot of Stanford University, but it has been appearing at their sporting events for nearly 40 years. It all started when the Stanford Junior Varsity Marching Band paraded a series of inappropriate mascots (such as a French Fry, and a steaming manhole) for the mascot-less school onto a field during a halftime performance. "The Tree" was so popular the band adopted it as it's official mascot and it has been a fixture at Stanford's sporting events ever since.

Over the course of it's existence it's been stolen several times, beaten up and had it's twigs broken while performing by shirtless rival fans, and arrested for public intoxication when it's "trainer" was spotted sipping from a flask throughout an event.

Brutus Buckeye

Sticking with tree-themed mascots, here's Brutus Buckeye, the official athletics mascot for the Ohio State Buckeyes. What's a buckeye, you ask? It's a tree, the state tree of Ohio to be precise, and Brutus is a giant buckeye tree nut. Brutus is also a member of the Mascot Hall of Fame, elected in 2007.

In 2010 Brutus was attacked by Rufus the Bobcat, the mascot of the rival Ohio Bobcats before a football game. Rufus' first attempt to hit Brutus was so hard his costume head fell off, undeterred he ran after Brutus and pummelled him from behind. Security had to be brought in to pull Rufus away and the man inside the costume was fired immediately. It was later revealed he sought out the job of Ohio's mascot for the sole purpose of attacking Brutus the first time the two teams met.

Big Red

Western Kentucky's "Big Red", like Brutus Buckeye, is a member of the Mascot Hall of Fame's Class of 2007. Red, created in 1979, is meant to be a symbol of the WKU students' school spirit... their school spirit apparently resembles a giant red blob.

A major lawsuit was launched in 2004 with Big Red at the center, WKU claimed an Italian television network was using an exact copy of their mascot to promote some of their television programs. Red couldn't pull out the victory, the Italian judge ruled in favor of the local television station denying WKU the $250 million in damages they were seeking.

Otto the Orange

Who knew fruit could be so disturbing?

Syracuse's "Otto the Orange" was adopted by the university as their official school mascot in 1995 following his use in an unofficial capacity for nearly 20 years. Since 2004 Syracuse's teams have been known as the Orange (previously they were the Orangemen and Orangewomen), the name was applied simply because that was the predominant color of the team. The school previously had worn pink in the late 19th century... Syracuse Pinkmen probably wouldn't have stuck around as long.

Sammy the Slug

The University of California at Santa Cruz athletic program goes by the name of "Banana Slugs". Not your typical team nickname, it's certainly unique. A banana slug is, basically, a yellow shell-less snail, one found commonly on the ground level of California's famous Redwood Forest. 

An attempt was made to rid the school of it's interesting moniker, when the school applied to join the NCAA the school chancellor submitted the name "Sea Lions" instead. Students despised the removal of their loveable banana slugs and held an unofficial vote between the two names, when Banana Slugs won by a wide margin the school relented and changed the name back.

Sammy the Slug, the official school mascot, was introduced shortly after and has been hangin' around scaring Santa Cruz young-folk since 1986.

Lil' Red

Lil' Red scares me. Something about that face of his, always smiling, and staring, and smiling, and staring. Introduced in 1993, he's the newest of the two current mascots for the Nebraska Cornhuskers, the other is Herbie Husker. Lil' Red is an air supported mascot, it's trainer wears a fan belt which inflates the costume allowing it to do all sorts of stunts a regular mascot could not usually perform.

Like Big Red and Brutus Buckeye, Lil' Red is a member of the mascot hall of fame, inducted along with the others in 2007. That was one oddball class.

Cayenne

It's a giant cayenne pepper with a human face. Yup, that's "Cayenne", the "spirit leader" of the University of Louisiana at Lafayette's sports teams, the Rajun' Cajuns. Why a cayenne pepper? It's a popular ingredient in the local Acadiana style of cooking.

Cayenne was introduced in 2000 and he is not an official school mascot, but he somehow still finds his way onto the sidelines at every basketball and football game.

Super Frog

"Super Frog", the official mascot of the Texas Christian University Horned Frogs has the distinction of being the oldest mascot on our list; first introduced by TCU in 1897. After several decades appearing on everything from yearbooks and eventually even the official school seal, a costume was created and he began appearing at sporting events in the years following the second World War.

Previously known as "Addy the All-American Frog", he was re-christened "Super Frog" in 1979.

WuShock

WuShock is the official mascot of the Wichita State Shockers, this obnoxious frat-boy version of SpongeBob SquarePants first appeared in 1948 and was given his "tough guy" look by a marine who had just returned from serving in World War II.

But, uh, let's try to ignore the fact that his nose looks like something else entirely, okay? Good.

Chris Creamer is the creator and editor of SportsLogos.net. You can follow him on twitter at @sportslogosnet.