Blue White Illustrated

needs, to bring more value to our fans? What are the best ways to do those things, and then what are the price tags going to be on those? How much are those going to cost?" Barbour has embarked on these types of major infrastructure projects before. During her tenure as athletic director at Cal, the university built a $153 million sports performance complex and also spent $321 million to seismically retrofit Memorial Stadium. In addition, before joining Barbour at Penn State, deputy athletic director Phil Esten was an ad- ministrator at Minnesota, where he spearheaded efforts to build an on-campus football stadium. A new stadium at Penn State would have to be huge, as the Nittany Lions have finished in the top five nationally in atten- dance 24 years in a row. Even though Penn State is not hemmed in on its eastern edge, leaving it with room to build, the cost of a 90,000- or 100,000-seat facility would likely dwarf the $303 million that Min- nesota spent on 52,525-seat TCF Bank Stadium. But an extensive renovation of the existing stadium would also be ex- pensive, and the price tag is going to be crucial consideration when Populous presents its findings to Penn State. As Esten told the AP, "Don't show us a Cadillac if we can only afford a Chevy." In an interview with Blue White Illus- trated last summer, Barbour said that "philanthropy is going to be the corner- stone" of efforts to upgrade the univer- sity's athletic facilities. The university has already received $2 million from John Leone and $1 million from Paul T. Stecko to help fund improvements to the Lasch Football Building. Penn State will need more of that – a lot more – to transform its master plan into reality. "It's going to hinge on the generosity of Penn Staters who want that, who want that for our community, who want that for our students, for today's stu- dents and today's student-athletes and tomorrow's students and tomorrow's student-athletes," Barbour said. "I be- lieve there are very successful Penn Staters who have significant capacity who can move that along, give that mo- mentum in an instant." In addition, she pointed to Penn State's 600,000 living alumni. "We've got the power of passion along with the power of numbers," she said. "We've got to make it clear what the need is, what the case is, and why it benefits Penn State and why they should participate, and I think we're starting to do that." Tim Owen contributed to this report. It had been in place since October 2005, a span of 72 games. But a8er Penn State completed its recent 7ve- game homestand, groundskeeping crews peeled up the 7eld in Beaver Stadium and replaced the sod with rolls of new Kentucky bluegrass. The resodding work was completed on Oct. 16, and the 7eld is expected to be in pristine condition when Penn State plays its next home game Oct. 31 against Illinois. Herb Combs, Penn State's supervi- sor of athletic 7elds, said a number of factors went into the decision to re- place the old playing surface with new sod from Tuckahoe Turf Farms, a nursery in Hammonton, N.J., that also supplies turf to the Philadelphia Eagles, Pittsburgh Steelers and Cleveland Browns. "The age of our playing surface, the intense nature of 7ve straight football games, the weather we endured, and the high standard we hold ourselves to combined to bring about this deci- sion in order to continue providing the most stable playing surface possi- ble," Combs told GoPSUsports.com. "The new sod will be better than the previous playing surface for the next two games [in 2015] and into 2016." The previous playing surface had been installed prior to Penn State's game against Ohio State on Oct. 8, 2005. TURF BATTLE Work crews get the field ready to be resodded with strips of Kentucky bluegrass brought in from a nurs- ery in New Jersey. FOOTBALL Field resodded after homestand

• Cover