Oklahoma State will host Houston in it’s first home game of the season. The stadium capacity is now 60,000, and the game against Houston could break the all-time attendance record set 29 years ago.
After traveling halfway across the country for its season opener, OSU will return home to the familiar faces of Stillwater for the next four games.
The strange part for the players is that they will still be playing in an unfamiliar stadium.
For the first time, the Cowboy football team will take the field this Saturday for a game in the completely bowled-in Boone Pickens Stadium.
OSU will be looking for revenge against the visiting Houston Cougars, who beat the Cowboys 34-25 in 2006. Kickoff is set for 6:05 p.m.
Linebacker Andre Sexton said the opening of the new west end zone will add even more excitement to a home opener against a dangerous Houston team.
“We’ve got the new stadium we’re ready to show off, and we want to start off the season with a bang at home,” Sexton said. “We don’t want to try to give up any games away at home, especially since we owe Houston. Everyone’s fired up right now.”
Although Boone Pickens Stadium’s grand opening will officially take place in 2009, Saturday’s game will still display a large part of what has happened to the stadium for the past couple of years.
A new sound system has been installed on the outside of Gallagher-Iba Arena for in-game music and public address announcements.
The west end towers have completed exteriors and rise dramatically over the rest of the Oklahoma State campus.
But the most important part for coach Mike Gundy and the team is the seating that stretches all the way around the end zone.
2007 capacity for Boone Pickens Stadium was 44,700, making it last in the Big 12 for seating capacity.
Saturday, fans will have access to 60,000 seats.
The attendance record for a home Oklahoma State game is 51,458, set in 1979 against Oklahoma. That record will likely not last much longer with several big home games approaching for the Cowboys.
Gundy said that the new end zone will trap in the sound from the crowd and make it harder for opposing offenses.
“This is a loud stadium to play in to start with,” Gundy said. “I would think now with the enclosure and with the sound bouncing off [Gallagher-Iba] and now it will have an opportunity to stay in with the [west end zone] there should be some crowd noise, and should be an advantage for us.”
Even without fans in the stadium, safety Ricky Price said he can notice a difference in how the sound echoes when they are on the field.
“During two-a-days we had a little sound test that’s always in the practice,” Price said. “The music was going off and I could just tell it was echoing from the end zone to the back end zone and from side to side, and I can just tell it’s going to be loud in there.”
Sexton said the new setup will not only be an advantage for the Cowboys but will help the gameday atmosphere as a whole.
“I know that when the fans get in there and the paddle people, they are definitely going to have fun,” Sexton said. I think moving the students around a little bit different, it’s going to be surrounding the opposing team.
“It’s going to be pretty crazy in there.”
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*Just a note - you mean its - not it’s (it is).
Okie light is going to get lit up tomm. Going to be a great stadium inauguration
What?……………..u must be an aggie
where in my set did i use it or it’s
only thing that resembles it or it’s is you all gettin lit up 66-21
LOL.
As funny as aggie bashing is (sarcasm) it takes a big person to point out errors in a college newspaper where students are still learning. They do a good job on a regular basis while maintaining full-time class schedules. I bet you wouldn’t like it to much if there was a comments section under every mistake you made. Just a thought. Oh yea, the “aggies” won 56-37 and took a knee on the one or it would have been worse, just in case you had your head so far up your ass you couldn’t tell what happened. Good day.
Where’s Coogfan? I sure miss him.
Dear Reality Check,
The problem is - I did teach journalism at OSU. I sure do not want to my beloved O’Colly falling prey to the NewsMess syndrome. There has to be one paper in town that gets it right.
I’m not an Aggie and I don’t have my *** etc., I can tell you this however, my students would never had made such a basic error. Pull out an AP Stylebook, for Pistol Pete’s sake.
As Terry Clark once said, “Editors, Editors, where are the editors?”