Unfortunately, it took average Joe’s butt-in-seat almost half a season to recognize what it was we had in a coach/team… money opportunity lost.I think a practice facility/football complex is the most important facility upgrade needed. I'm going to look like I'm a UC Bearcat fan, but they are very close to us geographically, in stadium size, and are in a P4 conference. I believe that IU is a much better job, mostly due to being in the B10, but UC is kicking our ass with their stadium and practice facilities. They are way ahead of us, but the $$ is there if we keep winning and selling out MS. I guarantee that the most optimistic budget ever made by the athletic dept for 2024 has been absolutely blown out of the water already, and we still have 1 more home game left. We are talking going from like a $30,000,000 projection to a $60,000,000 haul from football. That's program changing $$ that will get reinvested in facilities and coaches salaries. While the price tag on UC's practice facility was like $130,000,000, Penn St is about to start a $700,000,000 stadium renovation. We can join the facilities arms race if we sellout all our home games every fall.
https://ipf.gobearcats.com/
Memorial Stadium renovations coming?
- Thread starter Pazhoosier85
- Start date
I guess we could have had 5K more for Maryland, but in fairness the weather was not great, and in the end it's not that much revenue lost.
The weather sucked. But it was still a helluva good crowd.
Do players care more about all those amenities or a better paycheck these days?
Who knows how much many/most of the kids are getting paid. I'm still in the camp that the players are still just kids. They want to feel like a big deal.
Almost brought a tear to the eye last weekend when they came over to the student section giving high fives & taking pictures at the end of the game. The place was packed & still rocking. They at least FELT like a big deal. Looking up, seeing the towels waving, hearing the crowd. Feels like real football. I can't imagine that there are too many 21 year olds jaded enough to not care about rah-rah. I'm sure they love the money, but overall I think they just want to matter.
So, long answer to a short question, I think the amenities matter because even the guy playing for, relatively speaking, peanuts can feel like a really big deal playing a big-time sport at a program taking itself seriously.
Most of the stadium renovations being discussed are more fan related vs. player amenities. Ideally these projects will have decent ROIs/paybacks -- more premium seating/suites leads to more revenue each year. There are ongoing maintenance and renovation needs that come up though, such as the press box.
It seems a lot of progress was made on player amenities over the past 10-15 years. At some point I wonder how fancy player facilities can get and it sure seems like the returns on upgrades can become diminishing. Sort of like the difference between a four and five star hotel -- at some point what's the difference and who cares.
It seems a lot of progress was made on player amenities over the past 10-15 years. At some point I wonder how fancy player facilities can get and it sure seems like the returns on upgrades can become diminishing. Sort of like the difference between a four and five star hotel -- at some point what's the difference and who cares.
watching a game from the endzone is horrible. need suites on the sidelines
While also striking the balance of having to pay players. I think the facilities arms race is going to slow as a result.
But we desperately need upgrades to stay in the game.
Lots of decisions to be made of where to spend the money. The one nice thing about facility upgrades is the longevity of the investment.
Update
In an interview with Coach K over the weekend C3 specifically mentioned a commitment from IU to get the "skyboxes" going.
Good to have that confirmation after we lost the momentum during covid.
Bummer our old friend isn't here to deny it. maybe he will finally stop by our tailgate to tell us about it LOL
They also included other sports in those renovations. They have not done one football only project. It’s dumb and insane to not start putting in better facilities. Football is the bus. Start with that dump of a practice facility.
Get some of that North Endzone architecture on the East and West sides and the stadium could really look amazing (looks pretty good now imo except the press box).
Lane stadium shell and press box is nice and matches our stadium. If people don’t know already it’s an almost exact copy of our stadium.
I looked once and found it mildly interesting they didn’t use the same architects we did. Same with Wake Forest. Someone else copied or used Memorial Stadium as inspiration.
