Was the old 25,000 seat setup at Memorial Stadium better than our phase 1 expansion 18,000 seat stadium?
Just pour some concrete and bolt on some metal bleachers!
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Thatâs the purpose Iâm sure. Iâm all for it if it works
Davidson has rich alumni that care.
No one needs to explain to you why those arenât even apples to oranges level comparisons.
We could have had that same tower for $20m in 2013. Instead we built a building that we plan to demolish in this âexpansionâ. We could have made the endzone seats a banking for lawn seats/future expansion and put that money into something like weâre getting now.
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Preaching to the choir on this buddy. I have posted many times over the years (since day one) on here we should have built a legit âtowerâ AND more seats from the get go. Many people basically said âwe donât need thatâ.
The plan was to stay at FCS level up to 10 years but plans changed fast when CUSA asked us to join. This put us behind on building that it will take years to catch up. We were already behind on locker rooms since FBS has more scholarships so we needed more space, stadium, lights, etc. The important thing is we are moving in the right direction, and hopefully we can start phase 2 as soon as phase one is complete. If we had a group of huge donors we could do everything at once, but we do not have a T. Boone Pickens.
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Our stadium was too big for FCS and too small for FBS. Doesnât matter what timeline Phil thought we were on, the endzone seats have always been a mistake and the one story âpress boxâ too. If you planned to convert it to all suites with the construction of a proper tower than it made some sense, but tearing it down indicates a lack of foresight.
Our stadium is the Chevy Avalanche of football stadiums.
What you say is basically true (about staying at FCS for some amount of time, but mainly because you had to stay FCS for 2 years, essentially) -----however anyone paying close attention should have known we wouldnât be staying FCS for 10 years. One of the main findings from the âstudy groupâ (headed by Mac Everett) was that in order to be successful in THIS market, we had to compete at the âhighest levelâ (ie FBS) and I think Mac actually stated that they didnât think this market would support an FCS team after the ânewnessâ wore off.
I remember questioning why we were doing the full horseshoe and not doing a proper press tower, or a partial second deck on the student side, but that milk is spilt.
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IMO one of the dumbest moves was not installing lights for the first years.
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The first three games were brutally hot. Made me not really want to attend games much after the first year until the second half of the season.
Now Iâve just completely lost interest in football, college or pro.
clt says the avalanche with the cladding looked funky, but the mid gate rules
I looked outside. The sky is not falling. Whereâs Henny Penny? After reading this thread, should I go find the nearest bridge?
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$$$$
All comes down to that. Stadium designs and coulda shoulda woulda. We didnât even hit the fund raising Phil said we had to hit to start football.
We donât have enough people that step up and donate money and with nil and facilities and increasing operational budget we have too many things pulling from a small pot with very little recent winning and trying to talk people into giving away their money into a system that is more tilted against us than ever before.
Then you have people like me so agitated at the current climate they even have stopped donating or sent their money away from football and basketball.
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Thatâs it. I worked at CU when the new AD Rick George came on board. He spent the first 2-3 years raising money for an indoor facility and expansion to Folsom field. Thatâs all he did. He was able to get the money too. So they built something rather quickly. Look at the field in 2014-15 and now. Money moves things along.
Itâs disheartening to know we have to move at a snails pace and winning will be the only way we move the needle when it comes to generating more money, which for MbB and FB thereâs been very little of for the last decade. Just build the tower and hopefully fill in the rest by the time ole miss comes into town and Iâll be happy.
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Not to put too fine a point on it, but this relatively major news about our football program hasnât moved the needle on this fan board in over three days (less than a week old).
Takeaways:
- Any expansion is a positive.
- This one has divided the board 50/50 on whether it is enough or not.
- This expansion isnât generating excitement in the online fanbase.
Some of this might change with official renderings and actual construction, but this is a tepid reception at best.
@Nineradvocate I nominate this thread be merged with the the Official Stadium Construction thread.
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The build up was too long combined with announcing only 3k extra seats (even if phase 1) = ptftftftff
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I agree with all of that, but if you canât get your most loyal and involved fans to get excited about this type of thing (despite the time involved), something wrong is happening.
I hate feeling like our administration has no clue whatsoever on how to market our programs and that itâs a decades long issue to boot.
Iâd be happy if I had those upper level seats between the 35s