04/20/24
October 21, 2008
Best High School Football Stadiums: Check out the photo gallery of the stadiums described, including, of course, Stadium Bowl, the cool stadium in Tacoma, Washington, which was seen in the Heath Ledger movie, "10 Things I Hate About You." Also look at Tad Gormley Stadium in New Orleans, flooded by Hurricane Katrina.
Some nice stadiums there. Been to the old Valdosta one and not to shabby at all (randomly enough, I tried googling for valdosta football and the first hit gets a big fat warning from Google & FF). That said, working in a K-12 school, the thought of spending $8m on an athletic complex blows my mind. You can get some very very nice improvements for that kind of money.
posted by jmd82 at 11:16 PM on October 21, 2008
They should have taken a look at Round Rock Stadium that is home field for 2 of the 4 Round Rock Texas high schools share. Beautiful facility, the new turf, great seating, parking and it is equipped with a jumbo-tron screen for all those replays. It is also setup for soccer. The stadium seats 11,000.
posted by bruce2ww at 08:25 AM on October 22, 2008
My high school stadium was rented by the Green Bay Packers for their Sunday NFL games until Lambeau field opened.
posted by rhickok at 10:04 AM on October 22, 2008
These are all very nice stadiums, but are they really worth the money? As jmd82 points out, it's a little difficult to justify millions for an athletic complex when improvements for education are also needed. The HS stadium in our fair city was built on city-owned land with money donated by a local electrical contractor. It's not much. The stands will hold about 3,000 on cold aluminum benches; the scoreboards work most of the time; sometimes you can even hear the PA system on the far side of the field. It has a good field turf surface and is used by soccer, lacrosse, and field hockey as well as football. It is almost exactly halfway between the 2 public high schools, which in turn are only about a mile apart, separated by a park and a river. A third school, private parochial, also uses the field for a nominal rental.
Why do I include all this? It's only for the simple reason that what happens on the field is a lot more important than what the field looks like. Each year several hundred young men and women get the chance to complement their education with the opportunity to learn the values of teamwork, cooperation, and sportsmanship. It may be important to a community to have a fancy stadium, but the real "bang for the buck" comes from the coaches and educators that put the kids on the field.
posted by Howard_T at 10:56 AM on October 22, 2008
Now I know why my property taxes are so high. My local high school just spent 1.5m for artificial turf. These places are way over the top. My college stadium wasn't as nice. BTW dviking, to see the slideshow, shrink the photo to 75% and the scroll bar appears.
posted by Shotput at 11:44 AM on October 22, 2008
The Granite Bowl, Elberton, GA
http://www.elbert.k12.ga.us/ecchs/granitebowl/granitebowl.html
posted by dbt302 at 12:47 PM on October 22, 2008
Those are some very nice stadiums. However I'm with Howard and jmd on this one. The millions spent on stadiums that nice could be spent elsewhere, especially when education has become such a low priority (or at least it has in Michigan).
That said, the number one stadium is huge. Kelly-Shorts stadium at Central Michigan University was about the same size until they added on the student section which seats about ten-thousand more.
posted by Ying Yang Mafia at 03:44 PM on October 22, 2008
I live in Texas, and large stadiums like these are all too common. Artificial turf is the rule, since 8th grade my son has only played on fake grass.
Next week his varsity team plays the cross-town rivals at Texas Stadium. Given how the Cowboys have played of late, it should be an upgrade in quality.
posted by dviking at 12:53 PM on October 23, 2008
For some reason the slide show on the link didn't work, so I only got to see the field by the Hall of Fame.
Somewhat misleading to call that field a "high school" field when it is used by two colleges as well as for the Hall of Fame game.