So it turned out to be a two-fold issue. Thank you to Geoff and Clive who provided the larger part of the solution!

Step 1 - By default, the Date module renders a date field as a fieldset which is why the field name is differently styled and separated from the element a bit. The quick solution is to add a very short function to your template.php which tells the system to format a date field in the same way you'd format any other element. Like so:

function MYTHEME_date_combo($variables) {
  return theme('form_element', $variables);
}

I pulled that code from how to avoid fieldset in drupal date field

Step 2 - Edit the Content Type, Edit the date Field, expend "More settings and values", then expand "Advanced Settings", and change the Label position from "Above" to "None." That will get rid of the internal label.

So it turned out to be a two-fold issue. Thank you to Geoff and Clive who provided the larger part of the solution!

Step 1 - By default, the Date module renders a date field as a fieldset which is why the field name is differently styled and separated from the element a bit. The quick solution is to add a very short function to your template.php which tells the system to format a date field in the same way you'd format any other element. Like so:

function MYTHEME_date_combo($variables) {
  return theme('form_element', $variables);
}

I pulled that code from how to avoid fieldset in drupal date field

Step 2 - Edit the Content Type, Edit the date Field, expend "More settings and values", then expand "Advanced Settings", and change the Label position from "Above" to "None." That will get rid of the internal label.