Best Football Stadium in the ACC

[afh]

What do you folks think? I've been to Doak Campbell many times, the OB a couple of times, Bobby Dodd twice and Memorial Stadium once. I enjoyed the atmospheres but the OB can be quite lame if FSU isn't playing Miami. That's the only time that I've gone to games at the OB.

[Eastwestrob]

I personally like what N.C.S.U. has done to Carter Finley. Don't know if all construction is complete yet but this is now a 1st class facility.

Next I would mention what U.V.A has done to theirs. I am not baseing this on the amount of attendance, but strictly on the quality of the facility

[120North]

Its not Joke Shambles anymore. The stadium complex at FSU is phenominal. Has the OB fallen down yet? I haven't been to the stadiums on Tobacco Road in a while so I don't know what they look like now, I've heard they're nice also. There's just something about DC.

[Eastwestrob]

Can someone post pics of these stadiums.

[Topher1]

The Orange Bowl is awful (but I love it anyway). It just reeks of history (among other things). I love how it looks like its unchanged from the 60's. I really think the best are either Doak or Death Valley, but I voted for OB for sentimental reasons.

[orulz]

The renovations at Carter-Finley are just about done (they'll be ready for the 2005 season) and it's made quite a transformation from the unadorned slab of concrete that was there just 5 years ago, but there's two problems with the stadium that can't be fixed. First, the slope of the stands on the first level is too slight. Unless your seats are really close to the field, your view will be blocked. I like to have close, steep stands. This is probably because Carter Finley was built in a drained pond. Second, the location SUCKS. It's out in the middle of nowhere, with a grand total of THREE access roads. It's too far from anywhere to walk and impossible to serve with a shuttle bus. Try to get 50,000 people in on those access roads in before a game and there will be traffic jams for hours.

UNC's stadium is pretty nice too, but better yet, it's smack dab in the middle of campus. Doesn't matter that gameday traffic sucks; many folks (particularly students) can just walk.

[Eastwestrob]

Didn't UNC go thru a transformation not too long ago as well

[Justin6882]

Carter-Finley is a lot more accessible than Kenan will ever be, simply for the fact that its a pain in the butt to get into Chapel Hill on gameday (that is when they have near capacity games...which are few and far between ) Carter-Finley's atmosphere on gameday can't be topped by Kenan, there is more space for tailgating, more people, and even if students can't walk to CF, most of the student sections are always full. The wolfline offers shuttle service to and from games.

[avery]

Hands down, Clemson's Death Valley. I've been to all the ACC stadiums, except BC, and a majority of them are great but the atmosphere at Clemson on gameday is awesome. Take a look at the renovations underway at Memorial Stadium. It will be top notch when complete.

Clemson Stadium Renovations

Personally, my favorite in the ACC are:

1. Clemson

2. FSU

3. Virginia

4. UNC

5. NCSU

6. VT

7. Miami

8. Wake

9. GT

10. Maryland

11. Duke

12. BC (never been)

[Justin6882]

NC State University - Carter-Finley Stadium

NAME:

Named for Harry and "Nick" Carter, textile executives and NC State alumni, and the late Raleigh philanthropist A.E. Finley.

CAPACITY:

51,500 (After renovations, 63,000+ to be completed in 2006)

ORIGINAL COST:

$3.7 million. Half the funds were raised from alumni and friends, and the balance was borrowed.

CONSTRUCTION:

Plans for a new stadium were first drawn in the early 1960s. The land was donated by the N.C. Department of Agriculture, and ground was broken in 1964. A pond was drained and excavated to form the depression where the playing field now stands. More than 300,000 cubic yards of soil were removed during grading; 70,000 bags of cement were churned with sandstone to make 25,000 tons of concrete; and 1,350 tons of steel were used in construction.

This photo was taken in the 80s I believe, however this is what the stadium looked like when it was first built in the mid 60s.

Here it is a couple seasons ago before the Murphy Center and Vaughn Towers had been completed:

Here is the Murhphy Center - one of the largest Football-only operations centers in the country.

Here is Vaughn Towers, the new pressbox/luxury suite/club level seating facility:

Here is a computer generated image of what the final project will look like. Currently being constructed is Vaughn Towers, the press box/luxury suites on the left side. The Murphy Ops Center is in the front of the image.

The North Endzone is not currently bowled in, however the University is in planning stages now and will break ground after the 2005-06 season.

[redjeep77]

dear God, i know death valley had a capacity of 81,000 on just the sides of the stadium......but that new endzone addition is gonna be massive.... what is the new capacity going to be? I went to a Panthers game there in '95....big stadium, but the things i didn't like were the facts that the upper and lower decks didn't connect......and that the upperlevel (where we were sitting) was so steep that I felt like i was going to fall over.

[avery]

The capacity isn't supposed to be much bigger. With the hill as seating, I know that they can get 87-88K in there. With the expansion I think close to 90K

[Eastwestrob]

Thank you for those pics Justin

As I said earlier, I didn't base my vote on Capacity but on the Quality of the new facility. I guess they had to do something seeing the new RBC center right next door. Too bad all of this isn't located downtown

[thebarb20]

my season tickets are the in upper deck at death valley. the new west zone additional will add seating but only modestly. they are having to remove a couple of thousand seats to build that building. i think it costs $1000 a year for the right to buy those new seats that are under construction.

[Justin6882]

Too bad all of this isn't located downtown

especially the RBC Center...but lets not start that wishful thinking in this thread, LOL

[satalac]

i went with death valley. you know it's an intimidating place to play when the word death is included in it's name.

[orulz]

The wolfline offers shuttle service to and from games.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

That's very new. As in, within the last two years, I believe. From what I understand, it's very well patronized, but I can't believe that they only just thought of doing that.

Besides, on-campus residents can't ride that bus to their friend's tailgate party. It gets there too soon before the game starts.

[GvilleSC]

I voted for CLEMSON! There is no other place like it.-- The Hill creates the most awesome entrance in football and the most exciting. Once the West Zone is complete in a year or so, the icing will be on the cake. Chris Rix of FSU said it was the loudest environment he had ever played in (two years ago) and worse than the Swamp. That's pretty intense and quite a complement.

[afh]

I voted for CLEMSON! There is no other place like it.-- The Hill creates the most awesome entrance in football and the most exciting. Once the West Zone is complete in a year or so, the icing will be on the cake. Chris Rix of FSU said it was the loudest environment he had ever played in (two years ago) and worse than the Swamp. That's pretty intense and quite a complement. 

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

I didn't know that he said that. I was up there two years ago for that game. At times it seemed loud but it wasn't consistently loud. I guess once Clemson got up on FSU the fans decided to be quite. We left after half-time. Couldn't take that C-L-E-M-S-O-N any more. Can Clemson fans be that loud again when Texas A&M, Miami and FSU come to town this year? The thing I like about Clemson is when you're walking up to the stadium thru campus you see the various tailgates setup in front of the different campus buildings. Kinda of interesting. I also like the hill. We we're sitting on the bleachers next to the hill just above the band. It seemed like Clemson's band never stopped playing. We were hoping that the band would have stopped for a minute or two.

The other interesting thing about Clemson and GT's stadium is that the fields tend to slope down from one endzone to the other. Also the upper deck of both stadiums appear to be almost at street level while the lower portions of the stadiums appear to have been built by digging out a hole in the earth and building the lower portions of the stadium in the hole.

[csmurphy8885]

I pick Doak at FSU... here are some pictures of the improved seminole hunting grounds. The avg. attendence in 2003 was 83,149 (6 games).

[dgreen]

Clemson probably in reagrds to atmpsophere.

Orange Bowl has the most tradtion.

[Fruit Cove]

groves stadium is my fav but im biased.

[teshadoh]

Nicest environment - UVA, at least when I went there 20 years ago.

Most intimidating environment - I have to go with Clemson, partial of course since I went to many of their games during the Ford era.

[twincity]

My vote is for kenan and carter-finley. I like wake's too i just wish it had more seating, and a bigger field house. it also would be nice if it was closer to the school.

view from Deacon Blvd.

[Exile]

The other interesting thing about Clemson and GT's stadium is that the fields tend to slope down from one endzone to the other.  Also the upper deck of both stadiums appear to be almost at street level while the lower portions of the stadiums appear to have been built by digging out a hole in the earth and building the lower portions of the stadium in the hole.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Frank Howard field used to have a crown in the middle--a big one. You could see it from the stands. They fixed that a couple of years ago, though, and my understanding is that the field's as flat as a board--with no significant slopes in any direction.

I don't think they had to do any digging to build the stadium. It was built in a natural valley. Notice that the field is essentially level with the big parking lot and most of the practice fields and the track. If it weren't for the levees on Lake Hartwell, Frank Howard Field would be Frank Howard cove.

When I was a student there--in the Danny Ford era--they had a model in the lobby of the Clemson House that showed the lower decks being connected in the west end zone to form a U. There was no plan to connect the upper decks. They're pretty different and it might not be structurally possible--I'm no engineer though. Anyway, that model, if it had been built, would likely have sat well over 90K. The West Zone, which doesn't significantly increase capacity, will no doubt increase revenue a great deal more than ordinary seating.