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Kentucky Wildcats are No. 1 in the State — in Specialty License Plates

The Louisville Cardinals and KentuckyWildcats kickoff their annual football game Saturday with the team in red as big favorites. But, if you're heading to Lexington—or just driving around the state—what type of license plates are you most likely to see?Well, University of Kentucky plates. The UK logo is on 25,533 specialty license plates, according to  2012 data provided to WFPL from the Kentucky Transportation Cabinet.The UofL logo is on 19,318 Kentucky specialty plates.That's a 51-percent to 38-percent for the Wildcats. It shouldn't be surprising considering UK's historically statewide support compared to UofL's mostly regional reach. In a way, the numbers are a relative win for the Cardinals.Last year, Public Policy Polling asked registered Kentucky voters which team they cheered for.Kentucky was favored by 66 percent of Kentuckians (who are registered voters)—and Louisville was favored by 17 percent. So you can argue that Louisville fans are disproportionately supportive of their team, at least in terms of what types of license plates. I haven't figured out a way to get car flag data yet, so we'll have to go with this for now.Here's a breakdown of specialty college license plates (in a totally neutral purple) issued to Kentuckians, in handy graphic form:The plates are $31. They're $56 if they're personalized. In all, 294,728 specialty plates were active in 2012—and college plates made up the bulk of them.  (Note: These numbers also include private college plates, which generally make up smaller numbers.)Below is a breakdown of all specialty plates active in 2012 sent over by the Kentucky Transportation Cabinet.

Joseph Lord is the online managing editor for WFPL.

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