Facilities upgrades are always a hot topic among those that closely follow college athletics. Everyone wants the newest shiniest addition that can catch the eye of recruits and give fans a premium experience. Last year, App State announced the Go Fight Win campaign to raise funds to help finance a new video board at Kidd Brewer Stadium prior to the football game versus Miami. Over $170,000 was raised by 307 donors during the short campaign. For Appalachian, this new upgrade was less of an attention grabber as it was a much needed improvement over the current board. Audio quality has long been a complaint of those attending games, and Appalachian is aiming to fix that issue once and for all.
Construction has been slow, which is pretty typical in that world, and was compounded even more so by some random rocks that were found under the turf of the south end zone hill. The failed attempts to drill through the rocks led to inevitable controlled blasting that finished the job.
Sometimes you just have to blow some stuff up. 💣💥 pic.twitter.com/JTjaT1VvvL
— App State Athletics (@appstatesports) July 14, 2017
Meanwhile, across campus the Holmes Center is also getting an upgraded video board, as in, truly its first video board. The scoreboards that previously were installed at the Holmes Center were original, meaning they had been there since the building hosted its very first basketball game of meaning in November of 2000. Seventeen years is a long time between upgrades for basketball. The center hung board has several features that includes nine displays covering 1200 square feet and feature 2.1 million LEDS.
The main positives for both scoreboards starts the income the school will receive off sponsorships and advertisements. Previously, ad space was limited to the concourses and scorers tables. Starting in November, all eyes will be on the massive structure during timeouts of volleyball and basketball games for in game statistics, which was hard to come by depending on WiFi and cell phone service within the Holmes Center.
