FB: Ohio Athletic Conference

[rscl70]

In my humble opinion ONU has the best facility in the conference, and it's a great place and great atmosphere for a game.  They could add some more seating on the visitor's side though (and maybe a roof.)

Despite the rebuild at Ott it gets my vote for the worst in the conference because of the lousy wooden bleachers and lack of any facilities on the visitor side.  Even Etta is more comfortable.

[JK]

Reality,

ZING... Nice.

I didn't say ONU is "out" because of the flatlands, I just said I prefer Musky.  I also said I have never been to Dial-Roberson so I can't comment.

The pics I have seen surely show a very nice facility, I've just never been there and I always liked the scenery at Musky.

[Kira & Jaxon's Dad]

Here is a link to Musky's media guide.  It's a black and white picture, but it gives you a sense of the stadium and the trees surrounding it:

http://www.muskingum.edu/home/athletics/football/mediaguide.pdf

Here is an image in color from a different angle

Photo embiggined

[Kira & Jaxon's Dad]

For sheer "beauty" in a stadium, you can't beat Muskingum in the fall.  I think most OAC'ers would agree with me on that one.  McCongha stadium is older since Cap, ONU, JCU, etc have built new facilities and others upgrade, but the hills in the fall, when the trees change colors... nice. 

Quality of the surrounding beauty is cancelled out by the play on the grass?

They now have Pro Grass Turf.

[Kira & Jaxon's Dad]

When you attend Cap when JK did, you probably enjoyed looking at the leaves on the trees more than you did looking at the scoreboard.



I think it's unfair to say ONU's out because of the flat land of NW Ohio.  The original poster (as I understood him) was saying that ONU's stadium is a nice facility and a great place to watch a game.  I haven't been to a game at Dial-Roberson but I can say from visiting and touring that it is in a great spot.  And that, I believe, is what the poster was referring to.  It would be great to see if that is correct.





In my opinion, this view in the fall would be every bit as nice as Musky's and this view comes with the added bonus of home victories.

And like Bernlohr it's a million times better than it's predecessor. 

Larger picture of the area:

ONU Dial Robertson and Surrounding Area

[seventiesraider]

Muskingum's setting is beautiful but I can hardly call that a stadium. The word "field" comes to mind. Much like Hiram, the scenery is totally un-matched by the football being played in front of it. I tend to favor the locations surrounded by their campus's (sp?) although Otterbien is too closely surrounded by it's campus. Sorry, a  lot of my favorites ended up in the NCAC.

Gotta agree Bernlohr is is a great improvement.

[HSCTiger74]

Photo embiggined

"Embiggined" ... I like that. Did you coin it yourself, and can I use it if the circumstances ever dictate?

[Knightstalker]

Here is a link to Musky's media guide.  It's a black and white picture, but it gives you a sense of the stadium and the trees surrounding it:

http://www.muskingum.edu/home/athletics/football/mediaguide.pdf

Here is an image in color from a different angle

Photo embiggined

From the pictures it looks like a beautiful campus.

[Kira & Jaxon's Dad]

Photo embiggined

"Embiggined" ... I like that. Did you coin it yourself, and can I use it if the circumstances ever dictate?

I think I saw it on one of the other boards.  Don't remember which one...

[Knightstalker]

Back when they had a football team NJCU had a nice place to watch a game.  Again the view of the bay was nicer than what was happening on the field.  Still a nice place to watch a baseball game, although its nickname of "Candlestick East" is very fitting.

[HScoach]

This is an interesting debate.  

I might be in the minority, but I really like the old brick stadiums and Musky's is easily at the top of my list.  Absolutely beautiful setting in the hills.  It looks exactly like a small college postcard to me.  The stadium isn't fancy or overly well taken care of, but it just has "it" for me.  The press box is old school but open with a great view of the field and extremely convenient to get in and out of.  This is everything I think of when I think of D3 football in the fall.

I really like Ohio Northern's stadium, especially when you factor in what it used to be.  The layout is perfect and the stadium is beautiful, but the setting is lacking.  The stadium kind of sits off by itself and seems disconnected from the rest of campus and it's boring terrian.  Sorry RC, but I'm a eastern Ohio guy and need hills and trees to feel at home.  The press box is nice, but too small to handle the crowd when MUC comes to town.  My first trip to Dial-Roberson was spent on the black roof of the pressbox surrounded by bees on a sunny, 95 degree day because they ran out of room in the box.  Not fun.

I doubt many people will agree with this, but I like George Finnie stadium.  The playing surface always sucked until this season, but there are few places that hold as good of memories as Finnie does for me.  The night game Mount played at BW back in '02 when Pugh was a senior and Adamson was hurt was electric.   The week 10 OAC clincher in the '98 game when Jason Hall's interception turned the game is one of my favorite road games ever.  I can see where it would look too big and cold if it wasn't full, but when rocking it's a jewel.  Nice, clean, well built stadium.  Press box isn't a favorite as it's another one where everyone is crammed into a large room together.  Whoever thought having the PA guy sitting 5 feet away from a radio crew was a good idea should be slapped.

My favorite atmosphere in terms of the campus setting and the entrance to a stadium is John Carroll.  The large brick arches in the heart of a beautiful campus is striking on the way in.  Once in however, the stadium is way too small and way too much aluminum.  Sorry, but I think of a high school stadium when I see everything metal.  It's fancy and new, but lacks charm.  The pressbox is a terrible design with one big room holding all reporters, broadcasters and SID folks sitting together with no windows to open.  Feels like your calling the game from a mile away in a glass bubble.   Calling the game from the old, small, open pressbox behind the visitor's stands is better even though you miss out on the goodies in the regular box.

Capital's stadium is OK on all fronts.  Not great, not bad.  Too bad they couldn't get more room.  Kind of reminds me of a poorman's version of John Carroll's stadium.  

Otterbein's is a terrible version of John Carroll's without the beautiful campus setting.  The design of the stadium is a joke and there are visitor stands for about 50 people.  Tops!  The stadium is new, but completely lacks character and is poorly designed.  Press box is nice inside, but there's no way to get from the field to the box without hiking around the entire stadium.  Windows are tinted and slide sideways meaning if you have one open, the other is so dark you can hardly see through it.  Dumb.

Heidelberg's stadium isn't bad considering it's a HS stadium.  Not a great setting though.  Press box isn't fancy, but is very functional.

The battle for the worst stadium in the conference is between Marietta and Wilmington.  For me this is really hard to decide.  

Wilmington's looks like a small, cheap high school stadium (think Malvern) with no facilities, no atmosphere, no terrian in a crappy town 4 hours away from Alliance.   The only decent part of the stadium is the playing surface, but it really looks like a bad HS stadium in a town of about 2,000 people.  Please don't ask me how I know what that looks like.

Marietta's stadium is an old brick dump in a crappy town 2 hours away from Alliance that hasn't been repaired in decades and reminds me of the old Carroll County Fairgrounds where Carrollton HS used to play back in the day.  The visitor's "locker room" is the hallway under the bleachers that everyone walks thru to get the concession stand.  The only thing of note as a view from Etta's stadium is the big yellow Food 4 Less right off the corner of the endzone.  Nothing screams class like a Food 4 Less!

I guess forced to choose between to two, I'd put Wilmington behind Marietta for no other reason than it's twice the drive home after watching Mount go thru the motions in a 50+ point win.

[theaprof]

I don't remember if this has been posted before, but i found it interesting:

http://www.nfldraftscout.com/ratings/college.php?DSTeamId=299&sortorder=tsxpos&order=ASC

[formerd3db]

This is an interesting debate.  

I might be in the minority, but I really like the old brick stadiums and Musky's is easily at the top of my list.  Absolutely beautiful setting in the hills.  It looks exactly like a small college postcard to me.  The stadium isn't fancy or overly well taken care of, but it just has "it" for me.  The press box is old school but open with a great view of the field and extremely convenient to get in and out of.  This is everything I think of when I think of D3 football in the fall.

I really like Ohio Northern's stadium, especially when you factor in what it used to be.  The layout is perfect and the stadium is beautiful, but the setting is lacking.  The stadium kind of sits off by itself and seems disconnected from the rest of campus and it's boring terrian.  Sorry RC, but I'm a eastern Ohio guy and need hills and trees to feel at home.  The press box is nice, but too small to handle the crowd when MUC comes to town.  My first trip to Dial-Roberson was spent on the black roof of the pressbox surrounded by bees on a sunny, 95 degree day because they ran out of room in the box.  Not fun.

I doubt many people will agree with this, but I like George Finnie stadium.  The playing surface always sucked until this season, but there are few places that hold as good of memories as Finnie does for me.  The night game Mount played at BW back in '02 when Pugh was a senior and Adamson was hurt was electric.   The week 10 OAC clincher in the '98 game when Jason Hall's interception turned the game is one of my favorite road games ever.  I can see where it would look too big and cold if it wasn't full, but when rocking it's a jewel.  Nice, clean, well built stadium.  Press box isn't a favorite as it's another one where everyone is crammed into a large room together.  Whoever thought having the PA guy sitting 5 feet away from a radio crew was a good idea should be slapped.

My favorite atmosphere in terms of the campus setting and the entrance to a stadium is John Carroll.  The large brick arches in the heart of a beautiful campus is striking on the way in.  Once in however, the stadium is way too small and way too much aluminum.  Sorry, but I think of a high school stadium when I see everything metal.  It's fancy and new, but lacks charm.  The pressbox is a terrible design with one big room holding all reporters, broadcasters and SID folks sitting together with no windows to open.  Feels like your calling the game from a mile away in a glass bubble.   Calling the game from the old, small, open pressbox behind the visitor's stands is better even though you miss out on the goodies in the regular box.

Capital's stadium is OK on all fronts.  Not great, not bad.  Too bad they couldn't get more room.  Kind of reminds me of a poorman's version of John Carroll's stadium.  

Otterbein's is a terrible version of John Carroll's without the beautiful campus setting.  The design of the stadium is a joke and there are visitor stands for about 50 people.  Tops!  The stadium is new, but completely lacks character and is poorly designed.  Press box is nice inside, but there's no way to get from the field to the box without hiking around the entire stadium.  Windows are tinted and slide sideways meaning if you have one open, the other is so dark you can hardly see through it.  Dumb.

Heidelberg's stadium isn't bad considering it's a HS stadium.  Not a great setting though.  Press box isn't fancy, but is very functional.

The battle for the worst stadium in the conference is between Marietta and Wilmington.  For me this is really hard to decide.  

Wilmington's looks like a small, cheap high school stadium (think Malvern) with no facilities, no atmosphere, no terrian in a crappy town 4 hours away from Alliance.   The only decent part of the stadium is the playing surface, but it really looks like a bad HS stadium in a town of about 2,000 people.  Please don't ask me how I know what that looks like.

Marietta's stadium is an old brick dump in a crappy town 2 hours away from Alliance that hasn't been repaired in decades and reminds me of the old Carroll County Fairgrounds where Carrollton HS used to play back in the day.  The visitor's "locker room" is the hallway under the bleachers that everyone walks thru to get the concession stand.  The only thing of note as a view from Etta's stadium is the big yellow Food 4 Less right off the corner of the endzone.  Nothing screams class like a Food 4 Less!

I guess forced to choose between to two, I'd put Wilmington behind Marietta for no other reason than it's twice the drive home after watching Mount go thru the motions in a 50+ point win.

hscoach:

Thanks for sharing your opinions/comments regarding the various stadiums in your conference.  I would agree with most of your assessments, with the exception of one - Marietta.  First, Drumm Stadium is not brick but rather native stone quarried from the region as I recall the history; second, they did renovate the playing surface with the new style turf (after the floods a few years back); IMO, it does have character - I am prone to the historic old stadiums like you; also as I am a history buff, I think the college and the town both have great historic character as well (Besides, it is a great stopover on the way down south to W.Va, the Carolinas, eastern Georgian, etc.  )  I will grant you that the locker rooms underneath the stadium (when we visitied/played there several years ago) were not good, although I thought they had renovated those as well - I could be mistaken on that aspect and if so, then they obviously need to take care of that and upgrade.  Moreover, they have access to medical facility (a medical office with XRay less than 1/2 mile from the stadium) at one of their team physician's nice new facility so that is extremely convenient and many of these small colleges do not have that luxury.  So overall, I am of different opinion on that one with you

I agree with you that Otterbein could have done their new stadium justice with a much better design, perhaps some "historical" character to fit in with the historic buildings on campus surrounding it, even though they have the new athletic center just at the one end of the stadium.  I would also agree with you about the visitors stands - too small and it detracts from the overall look of such a facility.  In regards to the latter, it seems that many of the new stadiums at small colleges are going to that type of design i.e. extremely small visitor stands (Olivet, Adrian, Kazoo and even now Albion do that although Albion usually fills it's home side, brick stands built into the wall of the old and new athletic center - playing field is in its historic place since pre-1900; Kazoo has trouble filling its home side except for perhaps homecoming...but ahh, I digress ).  While perhaps the thinking is that it looks better if a small vistors section is crammed/jammed full as opposed to a larger stadium side stands being sparsly attended, still, I personally prefer the "better architectural" look.  Besides, if you have that one "big game" that has huge attendance, it looks better and you'll need that for such an occasion.

BW's stadium I've always liked and when it is near full, it is great.  The old style turf was okay in "its day" but terrible in modern times so it is good to hear they've replaced it as I understand you.  'Berg's and Tiffin's shared stadium is neat and neat setting, but agree with you and the others sharing with the h.s. is, shall we say, less desired from a "college standpoint" appearance - although economically it is probably the best solution for some colleges/small towns.  Hope College shares with Holland H.S. although there has been recent talk of the college buying it outright - still even though it is 27 years old, it does need to be renovated.

I won't go on further as I think you've covered the others pretty good (Musky's is now pretty neat as well).  I guess each college has to evaluate what is best for them regarding their stadiums and for some of the smallest schools, even when building new ones and/or upgrading, they sometimes don't go "that extra mile" which IMO in the long run would be better.  You have to do that to help in recruiting/attracting student-athlete fb'ers in this era as there is obviously much competition - another related topic of discussion that we've all had from time to time on these boards.  Anyway, thanks for your discussion - indeed, most interesting (and debatable ). 

[bushman]

Austin looks like a real stud.   Question is can he read?

[mr_mom]

Photo embiggined

"Embiggined" ... I like that. Did you coin it yourself, and can I use it if the circumstances ever dictate?

I think I saw it on one of the other boards.  Don't remember which one...

"A noble spirit enbiggens the smallest man"
- Jebediah Springfield

[People ... you saw it in a Simpson's episode.  Push away from the computer, eh?]