Hello Sports Fans, and Seasons Greetings here at the End of the Year.
To honor the Nation's Newest Collegiate Stadium, particularly in this Season of red and GREEN, we will focus on the UNIVERSITY OF NORTH TEXAS APOGEE STADIUM.
Your Roving Stadium Reporter attended the UNT game against Western Kentucky on November 26 in order to inspect first hand the newest collegiate stadium built in the 21st Century. This criterion specifies that the stadium must be completely new, not any renovations of an existing facility, no matter how extensive.
IN WITH THE NEW. Apogee Stadium meets this criterion as it is a completely new structure built across I-35 from the existing stadium, Fouts Field. In fact, I insinuated myself into Fouts Field before going into the new edifice to get some pictures of the lonely place, which is still used for track and field events and other university needs. Notice how small it looks, almost like a large Texas high school stadium. And the Mean Green played here from 1952 through the 2010 season! In fact the Vanderbilt Commodores defeated the Eagles (the formal name of the UNT teams) in this stadium in 1996, by 19-6 (one of only two Vandy wins that year). Notice in one shot that the outside facade of Fouts which faces the Interstate is now lit at night with ads for the university. Note in another the Eagle Wings End Zone can bee sen across the highway.
FOUTS FIELD FAREWELL FUN FACTS
Built in 1952, with an initial capacity of 20,000.
Both end zones added in 1994, adding 10,500 seats, for a total capacity of 30,500.
After the addition of the end zones, there was never a sellout. The closestthe school (then North Texas State University) came was against Baylor in 2003, at 29,437.
Greatest player and coach: Mean Joe Green and Hayden Fry.
TAILGATING. In fact, some tailgating still takes place in the lots next to Fouts, but most has moved to the open fields that surround Apogee. The new place is built out on the Texas lone pray-ree, with a small pond in front. Nothing but space surrounds it, so it is visible for quite a distance, and hundreds of thousands of vehicles pass it daily, as I-35 is the NAFTA Highway that journeys from the Mexican border at Laredo to Canada.
LEED Certification. Apogee is the first and so far the only stadium in the country to be awarded the Platinum LEED Certification from the U.S Green Building Council (LEED for you non-environmental types means Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design. Buildings nationwide compete for this distinction as it signifies your environmental and sustainable excellence.) Notable in the stadium design are these environmental features:
- Three wind turbines outside the Stadium that will generate electricity for a separate grid that will supply juice for the stadium and other athletic buildings.
- Recycled material used in the building structure itself.
- Windows that allow natural light and will reduce heating and cooling costs.
ACCESS. As Apogee is across one of the nations' busiest interstate highways from the campus, the school has efficiently made pedestrian access a priority. One overpass is made completely pedestrian before, during and after games. An underpass near Fouts is controlled by plenty of traffic officers to get pedestrians safely down the Access Road, under the Interstate, and into the Apogee area. Plus, as you can see in one photo, there is a fleet of Pedicabs that transports people from the campus to the stadium! Great work for college guys who want to build their legs.
THE WINGS OF THE EAGLE. The signature design element of the Stadium is the east end zone which is shaped like a V to stand for the wings of an eagle, the UNT team name. This is an awesome and dramatic structure, rising from the flat Texas pray-ree, with impressive lighting under the wings (on the concourse and under the stands). This end zone is steep and actually a bit scary. I climbed to the two points of the wings, and I must tell you it is a bit intimidating. The aisles are right next to the open air, and as you proceed upward, you are rising up into the velvet black Texas night with very little to hang onto! This game was only lightly attended so there were few fans in the Wings, mainly teenagers looking for romantic dark spots way up high. Once you have climbed to the top, the field plays out way below you, and the two sidelines seem remote. Literally quite the feeling of climbing high up in a tree to reach an eagles nest.
SIDELINES.Designed in two tiers, with the top one jacked up higher over a cross aisle midway between the two levels. Note the V-shaped stairs to get folks from the cross aisle up to the top tier. This is a significant improvement over the Metroplex neighbor SMU Ford Stadium which is now eleven years old. Ford has only one set of stairs into each upper section, going from the aisle up, and this design here offers two, splitting the patrons into two streams. The pitch of the sides is also much steeper than Ford, an enormous improvement. In fact, the lower bowl has you about as close to the action as any stadium. Excellent. close sidelines that make for on the action visibility. Very positive marks for that.
FACADE and CONCOURSES. The attractive brick facade is high and massive, making for an impressive entrance to this small venue. The concourses are spacious, wide and mall-like. Lots of concession stands and restrooms. Food costs less here than at Ford, on average a dollar less per item. But after all, these are UNT state school people, not SMU preps!
The MEAN GREEN MARCHING BAND. For those of you not immersed in the band world, the following information may come as a surprise. UNT has one of the nation's top five music schools, and produces many of the talented band directors and performers that run the world of music in Texas, and indeed the nation. The Jazz bands are considered the country's best, as the famous Lab Band Program here is simply the best anywhere. So, you have one of the nation's largest and best marching bands, playing before tiny crowds for a small-time-compass-school football program. In fact, let me make this assertion: in all my long years of listening to and watching collegiate bands, this is the best playing band I have ever heard. Their sound was rich, blended and perfectly in tune, as befitting a group of 350 future professional musicians. I have never heard such a grand and full sound on the field. There are some that have come close - eg. LSU, Texas, Michigan - but this was the tops. Their marching at halftime was sharp and very precise, although the pre-game was somewhat sloppy and I spotted some players walking around out of place. Their Game Management was good, too, and I thought it was fun how there would be 350 college kids talking, laughing and playing around - without instruments - in the stands, and then the director would turn around, call out a Time Out ditty, and instantaneously 350 people came to attention, in great alignment in the stands, and began playing terrifically. What response and control! This was largely due to the fact that the bandsmen had all of their music memorized. No need to grab for music pages,look for a wayward sheet, or adjust your lyre. (That is what holds your music when you are outside.) The entire evening they only used printed music one time, for a piece in their post game concert in the stands. In that concert the Band performed several difficult and jazz-oriented pieces that were above what you usually hear in the stands at a football game. One number featured a trumpet player, and after the piece the conductor said to the group, speaking of the soloist," I know you would not want to go home tonight and feel bad about how you played that last piece, so we are going to play it again because I know you can do better."
On campus during the year, at UNT it is often the top musicians who are the Big Men on Campus instead of the football players. Most of the students in the stands seemed to be friends with or were themselves part of the program, so they stayed in the stands through the post-game concert!
For once ESPN and I agree, as the sports heads on that network named the UNT Mean Green Band as the Best Collegiate Band in the Country for 2011. That is HUGE recognition! Way to Go!!
KICKOFF TIME. This is where UNT gets huge demerits. Like at most schools these money-driven days, the kickoff time is not announced until about two weeks prior. The flunkies in the Athletic Department told the world the kickoff was at 3 pm for this game with Western Kentucky. Then, about five days prior to the game, which was on Thanksgiving Weekend, TV stepped and to fill a void, wanted to televise the game - and changed the Kickoff Time to 6 pm. Who cares what this does to the few fans they have anyway up there, take the TV money and run. As you can see in the photos, the crowd was tiny, and the stadium capacity is only 30,850 to begin with! Screw the live paying fans, lets bow to TV and play a game in front of a 2/3 empty stadium. Bad, bad demerits to the administration that cowardly plays the lap dog to the TV goons.
NAME. What is an Apogee? Who cares. It is corporate, and that is not allowed. Huge demerits. Remember Enron Field, and soon to be gone Pizza Hut Park? NEVER name a collegiate stadium after some company.
CAPACITY. 30,850, meaning it is only 350 seats larger than Fouts Field. Wow, but what a design and visual difference!
POST GAME WRAP-UP. You have a visually very attractive brand spanking new facility, with a national class symbolic design element, a superb place to watch the sport, with one of the nation's very, very best bands to play for you, in a metro area of 6.5 million people...and about 9,000 people show up. Let's be candid - athletically UNT is a second tier athletic school, a wannabe in Division I-A, a large urban school with a lots of commuting and older students, and a beyond weak football schedule. (Except when they play the likes of Alabama as cannon fodder.) And you change the time of the game less than a week out. I will hand it to the green clad fans who were there. They were loud as they could be, having fun, and trying to do it just like they see it on TV. Many, following the lead of the cheerleaders, wore sunglasses - and this was a night game - to support Coach Dan McCarney who has severe eye problems and must wear dark glasses most of the time. (Note photos of cheerleaders and bandsmen with glasses.)
This stadium and band deserve a much better team and athletic administration. What irony - great band, stadium, cheerleaders ....... and tiny support and money-driven management.
Oh well. At least they get two out of four items top class: the Stadium and the Band. Now the team and the Administration need to catch up.
Happy Red and GREEN Holidays, and Merry Christmas.
We will we back to you soon with coverage of three of the South's GREATEST BOWL STADIUMS: the COTTON BOWL, the LIBERTY BOWL, and LEGION FIELD.
Byron, Your Roving Stadium Reporter
For once ESPN and I agree, as the sports heads on that network named the UNT Mean Green Band as the Best Collegiate Band in the Country for 2011. That is HUGE recognition! Way to Go!!
POST GAME WRAP-UP. You have a visually very attractive brand spanking new facility, with a national class symbolic design element, a superb place to watch the sport, with one of the nation's very, very best bands to play for you, in a metro area of 6.5 million people...and about 9,000 people show up. Let's be candid - athletically UNT is a second tier athletic school, a wannabe in Division I-A, a large urban school with a lots of commuting and older students, and a beyond weak football schedule. (Except when they play the likes of Alabama as cannon fodder.) And you change the time of the game less than a week out. I will hand it to the green clad fans who were there. They were loud as they could be, having fun, and trying to do it just like they see it on TV. Many, following the lead of the cheerleaders, wore sunglasses - and this was a night game - to support Coach Dan McCarney who has severe eye problems and must wear dark glasses most of the time. (Note photos of cheerleaders and bandsmen with glasses.)
