Collegiate Stadiums

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Tag Archives: Todd Graham

Arizona State Releases Sun Devil Stadium Renovation Plans

An artist rendering for the proposed renovations for Sun Devil Stadium (via thesundevils.com)

Arizona State held a press conference on Wednesday to announce a multi-year plan to upgrade Sun Devil Stadium. The stadium was last renovated in 1989 and has fallen behind the other Pacific-12 stadiums. In fact, the other 11 Pac-12 schools have spent over $1.3 trillion dollars on renovations since 1998.

The aggressive remodel is expected to cost around $300 million, although plans are far from being finalized. In fact, the school doesn’t even plan on hiring an architect until June.

The most noticeable part of the preliminary artist renderings is the canvas cover that would shade the fans while leaving the stadium open air.

The initial plans also call for the seating capacity to be reduced from the current capacity of 71,706 to between 65,000 and 55,000. The average attendance last season was right around the 55,000 mark and is a realistic target size.

Most of the seating reduction would be through the removal of the northern upper deck, while more seats would be lost from the installation of wider seats and improved leg room. Also scheduled to be updated or completely rebuilt are the rest rooms, concession stands, press box, suites, premium seating, sound system and video boards. The lower bowl will also be rebuilt and the southern upper deck will be built just 24-feet above the playing surface, which will be artificial turf.

An artist rendering for the proposed renovations for Sun Devil Stadium (via thesundevils.com)

The renovation will take four or five years if the teams continues to play all home games at Sun Devil Stadium. However construction could be completed faster if games are moved to another stadium for one or two years.

The cost would be unaffected by either plan and games would be played at either Chase Field or University of Phoenix Stadium. Moving games to Tuscan is not a viable option.

New head coach Todd Graham is certainly excited about the renovation plans, saying:

This venue will put us at the top of the league. That means a lot to recruits and shows the commitment of the university and the athletic department to winning.

It’s one of the great attractions coming here. This shows we’ve got a dynamic vision here. We want it to be unique to Arizona. This is a very unique place. This is going to be the most visible building on campus and one of the most visible buildings in this state, so it should represent this state in a unique way

Graham, coming from an Pitt which has an off-campus stadium and an apathetic fan base, also wants to make sure that the student section is a focal point of the new stadium, saying:

I’m looking to grow that student section. That’s what dominated (ESPN) GameDay. This facility is going to honor our past. Everything about this project is going to do nothing but enhance recruiting. It’s a big giant step forward in every regard.

Meanwhile, new athletic direction Steve Patterson seems pretty committed to the plan outlined above. While building a new stadium might be cheaper, he was quoted multiple times saying how important it is to keep the stadium between the buttes on campus.

We want to make sure we stay on this site. It’s an iconic spot, one of the iconic spots in all of college football. We want to be close to the student body and be able to honor the heritage and the folks that have worked here for so many years. But we have to operate in a world that is very competitive out there in terms of revenue generation and the kind of fan amenities and athlete amenities that other schools in the Pac-12 have.

I’ll certainly be interested to see how much the plans change once an architect is hired and fund raising kicks in. Arizona State plans to finance the renovation through donations, seat licenses for premium seating, Pac-12 television revenue and possibly bonds. Of course, ticket prices will also see a “moderate” increase.

However, Sun Devil fans shouldn’t be worried that the renovations will bankrupt the athletic department according to Patterson, who said:

We’re going to look at all the other financing options and revenue streams that could support this, but we don’t want to wind up in a situation where we’re house poor. We want to have an economic plan that allows this building to be built and to throw off the kind of revenues we need to drive a first-class Sun Devil athletics department.

Personally I think you will see a reduced plan put into place once a final price tag is announced and revenue generated by fund-raising is known.

I would expect all renovations to be finished for the 2018 or 2019 season as it seems the university would prefer to keep the team playing on campus throughout the process.

Todd Graham Leaves Pitt for Arizona State via Text Message

Back in September I was sitting in the UConn press box with just a seat between me and Big East Media guru Chuck Sullivan.

 

Since I had been down on the field taking photos during the first half of the game, I was about 30 minutes behind on my twitter timeline. Right as I caught up to current news, my timeline started moving quickly with the news that Pitt and Syracuse were leaving the Big East for the ACC without the Big East knowing what was going on. Unfortunately Sullivan left as soon as the news broke and I didn’t get a chance to ask for a comment from the Big East.

 

 

I remember remarking at the time that Pitt was leaving the Big East without even sending a “Dear John” letter.

 

Fast forward a few months and their coach, Todd Graham is leaving via a text message and Pitt players, fans and administrators aren’t too happy. Ironic coming from the same people who were trilled with the way they left the Big East for the greener grass of the ACC.

 

Now, that’s not to say that what Graham did was right, just that sometimes you get what you deserve, and if any school deserved this, it was Pitt.

 

Now, to the juicy part of the story, here is my understanding of what happened.

 

* Multiple coaches left Todd Graham’s staff to go work for Rich Rodriguez at Arizona

* Todd Graham asked Pitt Athletic Director Steve Pederson for permission to interview with Arizona State and was denied

* Todd Graham interviewed with Arizona State anyways

* Todd Graham stopped answering calls from Pitt administrators including Pederson

* Pederson had an official stop by the Graham house and was told “get off my porch”

* Todd Graham sends a text announcing his resignation and pending move to Arizona State to his Director of Operations, Blair Philbrick, and asks him to forward to the Pitt players

 

Official text of what Todd Graham sent to Philbrick.

 

“I have resigned my position at Pitt in the best interest of my family to pursue the head coaching position at Arizona State. Coaching there has always been a dream of ours and we have family there. The timing of the circumstances have prohibited from telling you this directly. I now am on my way to Tempe to continue those discussions. God Bless. Coach Graham.”

 

It should be noted that while Graham claims that he didn’t have time to meet with the Pitt players and tell them personally, it has been reported that he and Penni did find time to do a 1 hour photo shoot for Arizona State before leaving.

 

Today’s Best

a photo of a young Todd Graham which ties in with the photo of the day below

This is my new daily post on the day’s best stories, photos and links, often with my take on the situation. I know that many people write articles on the same or similar subjects every day, these links are just the one’s I enjoyed the most.

 

Let’s start with my favorite story of the day, which is a rumor that I like to think that Mark Ennis, Michael Felder and myself started, at least one recruit believes that Mike Leach will replace Howard Schnellenberger at FAU after this season.

Next up is the Texas A&M situation. To be honest, I don’t know what or who to believe anymore, but this article by Spencer Hall of SBNation is probably the best out there. And, if you don’t like Spencer, try this one from Andy Staples or this one from Kirk Bohls who has been the guy breaking most of the news on twitter.. Reports have the Big 12 targeting Notre Dame or BYU first if the Aggies actually leave, but I think Houston is the most realistic option. However, unlike some people, I think Notre Dame is possible since they would always be a top 3 team in the league and they could still have their own TV contract.

Looks like the Baylor Bears are desperate to keep A&M around with this silly news release of the day… 

If you aren’t a fan of re-alignment, maybe compliance is for you. Here we find a story outlining how Miami is being investigated because some felon named Nevin Shapiro had his lawyer provide information to the NCAA. Some people seem to think that this will bring down multiple programs while I think it will only bring down Miami, but it is going to be big if the evidence is real. I would think something similar to the USC penalties will be coming. Not good if you are a Hurricanes fan. Here is a good breakdown by Bryan Fischer.

Staying on compliance, we have the full 136 page pdf of the new rules proposals for the coming year. The most interesting to me is proposal 2011-87, which starts on page 127, that calls for conferences without a title game to be allowed to have teams play in end of season invitational games. To me, isn’t that what a bowl game is? For what it’s worth, the proposal is by the Sun Belt, which I think is just looking for more TV money. The best proposal in the entire list would allow for schools to pay for an entire team to be at the funeral of a deceased teammate or visit a seriously hurt teammate at the hospital.

This article from Smart Football traces the roots of the one-back offense to Dennis Erickson.

Here we have ex-NCAA president Cedric Dempsey claiming that superconferences are coming and will break from the rest.

Toomer’s corner is still not looking good.

And finally, our picture of the day from Penni Graham. Alright, it is actually two pictures if you count the one above but I liked both of them.

Pitt head coach Todd Graham's bowl game ring collectiona photo of a young Todd Grahama photo of a young Todd Graham