Osceola and Renegade
The Osceola and Renegade mascots were conceived by Bill Durham, a Tallahassee businessman and Florida State alumnus. He came up with the concept of a horseback-riding Seminole mascot as early as 1962, when he was voted into the school's homecoming court. He returned to the idea in 1977, and won the support of Ann Bowden, wife of head football coach Bobby Bowden, who helped make the idea a reality. Durham contacted the Seminole Tribe of Florida about the project, and chairman Howard Tommie had tribe members make the first costume for Osceola. Durham provided the horse, while Bowden helped acquire the various permits necessary to allow a horse onto the field.
Southeastern University (Florida)
Southeastern University teams are nicknamed the Fire and the school's mascot is known as Scorch. The university is a member of the National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics (NAIA), competing in The Sun Conference, formerly known as the Florida Sun Conference (FSC). The Fire are associate members of the National Christian College Athletic Association (NCCAA) after competing in both Division II and, more recently, Division I. The university added softball, men's tennis, and men's & women's cross country during the 2012-13 school year, and women's golf for 2013-14. Southeastern currently competes in seven men's and seven women's sports, after the addition of football in the 2014-15 academic year. Men's wrestling was added in the 2015-16 academic year, becoming the state's only collegiate scholarship program.