‘We spent $4.5 million for this moment’: Inside the 18-month mad-dash preparation for on-campus CFP games

Penn State’s Beaver Stadium has been hosting college football games since it first opened in 1960. However, subfreezing mid-December temperatures presented challenges that required a multi-million dollar winterization of Happy Valley’s massive football cathedral as it prepares to host the first-ever on-campus College Football Playoff game. 

“We spent $4.5 million for this moment,” Penn State athletic director Pat Kraft said in a conversation with CBS Sports.

Such is life for three of the four sites north of the Mason-Dixon Line hosting first-round games in the College Football Playoff this week. Cold weather and potential snow are forecast in State College, Pennsylvania, where the university usually shuts down the stadium in December, turning off the water and applying electrical heat tape to pipes to prevent breaks and leaks in the offseason.

“If not [for the changes], there would have been a lot of flushing toilets to keep the water running,” Kraft said with a laugh. “It would have been someone’s job to run around the building flushing toilets.”

Penn State, Ohio State, Notre Dame and Texas have spent the better part of 18 months preparing to host the first round of on-campus games in playoff history. The logistical challenges have been massive. Most fans tuning into the games this weekend will never realize how much preparation was needed for this moment.

“I don’t want to jinx anything, but we’ve been very impressed with how ready, willing and able the campuses have been,” said Brett Daniels, the CFP’s senior director of communications and branding. “We thought there might be more concerns, questions, pushback on things, but we spent the last year working closely with the schools and the conferences to build a general plan that…

Source link : https://www.cbssports.com/college-football/news/we-spent-4-5-million-for-this-moment-inside-the-18-month-mad-dash-preparation-for-on-campus-cfp-games/

Author : Brandon Marcello

Publish date : 2024-12-18 19:43:00

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