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  • The Facilities Plan

    Yes, I can confirm (again, if necessary) there is one.

    The SDSU administration is going slow with making it widely public, largely in consideration that any actual projects will need to be approved by the Regents, and they don't want to get out ahead of their governing board. I can buy that argument.

    The Athletic Facilities plan works off of the Campus Master Facilities plan. Basically, the area from the HPER Center north to the US 14 Bypass "belongs" to Athletics.

    The plan envisions Coughlin-Alumni Stadium being re-built, with 8,000 seat grandstands on the east and west sides of the field, and a suite/press box on the west side. The stadium seating would be expandable to a full-horseshoe with the open end to the north. An Athletic student development center is envisioned immediately to the north of the football field, and a fieldhouse capable of hosting indoor softball games, as well as baseball, football, track, and other outdoor-sport practices is envisioned to the north of the student development center. Something will need to be done to the west stands at CAS in the next 10-15 years, as the structure is reaching the end of its planned lifetime. The field will almost certainly be Field Turf.

    (Note 1: What they have is a high-level facilities plan, not a real stadium design, by the way. It's conceptual, which means that it could possibly change significantly once you start spending money and seriously talking to stadium architects about the actual configuration.)

    (Note 2: I personally expect to see a facilities fundraising drive to kick off in the next three to five years, primarily to pay for the replacement of the CAS stands and the construction of the student-athlete development center--that's not from any horse's mouth, but would be logical, at least in my own rabbit-fevered mind.)

    The placement of the baseball and softball fields are due to this Facilities plan that engineering consultant HNTB drew up for SDSU.

    Something that needs to be stressed is that this facilities plan is actually independent of the D-I move. In other words, it's a plan that SDSU would have been working off of anyway, regardless of whether or not we moved to D-I or stayed D-II. (Editorial comment: I'm guessing the main difference is that the plan will be implemented more quickly with us at D-I vs. D-II.)

    There is a full outdoor track envisioned by the plan at the north end of the athletics complex right along the US 14 Bypass, but it's possible that in 20-25 years, there just might be a new basketball arena there instead. (The plan is just a plan . . . it can be modified if it makes sense).

    (I'm using the word "envisions" a lot, since none of these projects are actually, you know, approved or anything. Need to keep the Regents happy, you know.)

    The fundraising emphasis is still on fully funding the athletic scholarships, because while new facilities are nice, they don't win games--athletes do.

    The athletic department is hoping that the new Equestrian Center will be a significant money-maker for the department. The plan there is for it to be one of the top equestrian centers in the country, bar none. They're pretty pumped about the prospects for the equestrian program.


    "I think we'll be OK"

  • #2
    Re: The Facilities Plan

    The fundraising emphasis is still on fully funding the athletic scholarships, because while new facilities are nice, they don't win games--athletes do.
    True, but you can have all the scholarships you want, if you can't attract the ones you want, then it doesn't really matter. Athletes do care about where and how they will be spending their time for 4-5 years.

    Comment


    • #3
      Re: The Facilities Plan

      Originally posted by filbert
      The plan envisions Coughlin-Alumni Stadium being re-built, with 8,000 seat grandstands on the east and west sides of the field, and a suite/press box on the west side.
      I assume this means each grandstand will hold 8,000 for a total of 16,000.  Does anyone know what the current ones hold?

      Thanks for all the info Filbert!

      Comment


      • #4
        Re: The Facilities Plan

        Originally posted by SD-STATE
        The fundraising emphasis is still on fully funding the athletic scholarships, because while new facilities are nice, they don't win games--athletes do.
        True, but you can have all the scholarships you want, if you can't attract the ones you want, then it doesn't really matter. Athletes do care about where and how they will be spending their time for 4-5 years.
        But if you don't have the money to offer the scholarships in the first place, you never get to the point of student-athletes turning you down because of facilities.

        Scholarships first, then facilities seems like a more rational plan than facilities then schlarships (which sounds a lot like "if you build it, they will come" which works pretty good in the movies but doesn't always pan out in real life).

        Reasonable Rabbits can differ in their opinions on this, however.
        "I think we'll be OK"

        Comment


        • #5
          Re: The Facilities Plan

          Is there actually a site or a place on the SDSU website where it talks about a new football stadium? I am excited to find out more about the stadium, even though sadly it wont be built for years. Are there any more interesting facts about what it will look like, if it will be a dome, if they will make it capable of having a dome, if it will be sponsored by a company such as Budweiser. It would be nice to know if there is any talk at all about this subject.
          I think it would be interesting if we got offered a stadium by, lets say Budweiser, if we would consider making our campus wet or if they would just build the stadium off campus. I am just pondering and would like to know if people feel the same way or if they have more information.

          Comment


          • #6
            Re: The Facilities Plan

            Originally posted by fabio208
            Is there actually a site or a place on the SDSU website where it talks about a new football stadium? I am excited to find out more about the stadium, even though sadly it wont be built for years. Are there any more interesting facts about what it will look like, if it will be a dome, if they will make it capable of having a dome, if it will be sponsored by a company such as Budweiser. It would be nice to know if there is any talk at all about this subject.
            I think it would be interesting if we got offered a stadium by, lets say Budweiser, if we would consider making our campus wet or if they would just build the stadium off campus. I am just pondering and would like to know if people feel the same way or if they have more information.
            As far as I know, no, the long range facilities plan is not on the web. I covered the reasons why in my original post.

            No, the plan does not envision a dome but an open-air stadium.

            If you ask nicely of the SDSU administration however, they'll show you the document that HNTB prepared for SDSU around the 2000 time frame. Promising to donate money helps in this process.

            Talk of (insert-your-deep-pockets-corporate-sponsor-here) sponsoring the stadium is crazy-talk, in my humble opinion--or, alternatively, message-board nonsense talk, take your pick.

            However, if you happen to be an executive vice president of a major corporation (or a good hunting buddy of said corporate bigwig) who has a high six-figure to seven-figure promotional budget, and an interest in sponsoring the renovation of SDSU's football stadium, please feel free to call Athletic Director Dr. Fred Oien at 1-800-952-3541 or 1-605-688-5625 to discuss opportunities for partnering with South Dakota State University Athletics. (This has been an unsolicited, uncompensated public service announcement from SDSUFans.com).
            "I think we'll be OK"

            Comment


            • #7
              Re: The Facilities Plan

              AMEN TO THAT!

              Comment


              • #8
                Re: The Facilities Plan

                It kind of dawned on me that at a Golf outing maybe in 1999 or there about I remember asking Dr. Oien about the wellness center and the proposal to add permanent seating on the east side. He told me as I recall that President Miller had put all construction projects on hold as she had found that SDSU did not have a current master plan, and until that plan was developed, everything was on hold. So the plan that Filbert saw was indeed the plan that was ordered by President Miller. President Miller was hired in late 1998 and 1999 would have been her first year as President. At least its fits the timeframe for my recollection.

                I think these plans need to have more openiness and if people can see whats going on maybe they do their part to help out financially. I think once the scholarships are endowed maybe we will be hearing and seeing more about the facilities plans. I am sure the staff is looking for the big corparate sponsors who would help with building of a new staduim. These people are hard to find. I think also some of the local sponsors who could help  are now committed for at least 10 years on the scoreboard advertising with Daktronics. We got 8 more years to go on that so I don't expect to see any facility drive in that time frame unless we start to have excess funds from donations and ticket revenue.

                Comment


                • #9
                  Re: The Facilities Plan

                  I totaly agree with the openess part as a strategy to get more people engaged in the project and contribute money.I don't think a knight on a white horse will come into town with a boatload of cash, but rather it's going to take grass roots effort.

                  Comment


                  • #10
                    Re: The Facilities Plan

                    Anybody know anything about the new baseball field? Is the plan to rebuild CAS before anything else is done or will SDSU have it's own ball field in the near future?

                    Comment


                    • #11
                      Re: The Facilities Plan

                      Originally posted by 76Rabbit
                      Anybody know anything about the new baseball field? Is the plan to rebuild CAS before anything else is done or will SDSU have it's own ball field in the near future?
                      I believe the baseball field is going to be completed. I am not sure to what extent, but I know Daktronics finished the scoreboard for the field.
                      We...ARE...STATE!
                      SOUTH...DAKOTA...STATE!!

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                      • #12
                        Re: The Facilities Plan

                        I'm not sure if I understood this right but it sounded like there was going to be some Frost locker room upgrades either this summer or next summer...Maybe EQguy could help me out if he knows more?

                        Comment


                        • #13
                          Re: The Facilities Plan

                          The locker upgrades are part of the Wellness Center project. They will be built on the north side of the HPER Center, while the Wellness Center will be built just to the west of HPER and connected to it by a walkway entering HPER near the swimming pool. This will be happening in, I believe, the next 18 months or so.

                          Master plans are just that...a guideline for the future. And it gives the school an opportunity to work out priorities for facilities. But all of that is subject to a lot of changes and a lot of variables, so the timetables are very flexible and thus, while available, are not big factors in finding funding. Donor research and solicitation is a sophisticated business and isn't done in a big public way.

                          The new Athletic Building which is to be built at the northend of the football stadium, will house locker rooms, coaches offices, strength and training facilities, athletic study areas, etc. That might break into the open sooner than you might expect. Rebuilding the stadium will most likely come after that...not before.

                          Comment


                          • #14
                            Re: The Facilities Plan

                            Originally posted by filbert
                            There is a full outdoor track envisioned by the plan at the north end of the athletics complex right along the US 14 Bypass, but it's possible that in 20-25 years, there just might be a new basketball arena there instead.  (The plan is just a plan . . . it can be modified if it makes sense).


                            Why can't they just add a new track along with a new stadium?  So instead of a single-use stadium, SDSU could have an outdoor athletics complex...
                            It would be nice to host a track meet and besides, most SD high schools have better tracks than the one SDSU currently has.

                            Comment


                            • #15
                              Re: The Facilities Plan

                              Why can't they just add a new track along with a new stadium? So instead of a single-use stadium, SDSU could have an outdoor athletics complex...
                              It would be nice to host a track meet and besides, most SD high schools have better tracks than the one SDSU currently has.
                              Most high schools have tracks around their football fields. Nothing says bush league then a FCS team having set up like Howard Wood. I have always wondered whey the athletic administration gave up on the old track, a new over lay is not terribly expensive. My old tiny HS did it a couple years ago. Now that they need to start over anyways, they might as well do it right and have a true outdoor track complex. With all the room they need for discus, javelin, high jump, etc all in one condensed area.

                              Comment

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