Michigan Stadium , dubbed " Big House ", is a football stadium for the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, Michigan. It is the largest stadium in the United States, the second largest stadium in the world and the 34th largest sports venue. Its official capacity is 107,601, but it has accommodated a crowd of over 115,000.
The Michigan Stadium was built in 1927 at a cost of $ 950,000 (equivalent to $ 10.8 million in 2016) and has an original capacity of 72,000. Prior to the construction of the stadium, Wolverines played football at Ferry Field. Every home game since 8 November 1975 has attracted a crowd of over 100,000, an active streak of more than 200 contests. On September 7, 2013, a match between Michigan and Notre Dame Fighting Irish drew the 115,109 crowd, record attendance for college football games since 1927, and record attendance of the NCAA single game at the time, overtaking the previous 114,804 record set two years earlier for the bout the same one.
The Michigan Stadium is designed with a foundation to allow the stadium capacity to be expanded beyond 100,000. Fielding Yost imagined a day where 150,000 seats would be needed. To keep construction costs low at the time, a decision was made to build a stadium smaller than Yost imagined but to include the foundation for future expansion.
The Michigan Stadium is used for Michigan University's major graduation ceremonies; Lyndon Johnson outlined his Great Society program at the 1964 commencement ceremony at the stadium. It also hosts hockey games including NHL Winter Classic 2014, regular NHL matches between Toronto Maple Leafs and Detroit Red Wings with an official attendance of 105,491, a record for hockey matches. In addition, the 2014 International Champions Cup football match between Real Madrid and Manchester United has a presence of 109,318, a record audience for football matches in the United States.
Video Michigan Stadium
History
Initial history
Before playing at the Michigan Stadium, Michigan played his game on Ferry Field, which at its peak can hold 40,000 people. Fielding Yost acknowledged the need for a bigger stadium after the original expansion into Ferry Field proved too small, and persuaded the regents to build a permanent stadium in 1926. Made after the Yale Bowl, the original stadium was built with a capacity of 72,000. However, at Yost's urging, temporary benches were added at the top of the stadium, increasing capacity to 82,000.
On October 1, 1927, Michigan played Ohio Wesleyan in the first game at the Michigan Stadium, easily, 33-0. The new stadium was then officially sanctified three weeks later in a contest against Ohio State on October 22. Michigan had ruined the Ohio Stadium's official stint in Columbus five years earlier and won again, beating Buckeyes 21-0 in front of a living room. - only crowd of 84401. In 1930, an electronic scoreboard was installed, making the first stadium in the United States using it to keep official game time.
In 1956, the addition of a press box increased the stadium's official capacity to 101,001. One "extra chair" in the Michigan Stadium was said to be reserved for Fritz Crisler, the athletic director at the time. Since then, all official capacity capacity of the Michigan Stadium has ended at "-01", although the additional seating location is not specified.
Prior to 1968, Michigan Stadium maintained the policy "No women or children are allowed in the field". Sara Krulwich, now a journalist photo for The New York Times, was the first woman on the field. The old radio broadcaster Bob Ufer dubbed the Michigan Stadium "The hole dug Yost, Crisler paid, Carpeted Canham, and Schembechler filling every Saturday afternoon". Since November 8, 1975, the stadium has housed more than 100,000 fans for every home match. The match against Indiana University on 25 October 1975 was the last home game of 100,000 attendance in Michigan. The size of the Michigan Stadium is not fully visible from the outside as most seats are below ground level.
Modern era
In the mid-1980s, the Michigan Stadium was known as "The Big House". The Michigan game against Ball State University on November 4, 2006, is a crowd of 200 consecutive people over 100,000 fans. Traditionally, when the game presence is announced, the public address announcer (historically Howard King) thanked the fans for "being part of the biggest crowd watching football matches anywhere in America today".
On September 9, 2006, participants of the Michigan football game against Central Michigan Chippewas experienced the first weather delay in stadium history after lightning struck the vicinity during the first quarter and the game was halted for about an hour. On September 3, 2011, Michigan and Western Michigan agreed to end their game with 1:27 remaining in the third quarter due to ongoing lightning delays. This is the first time Michigan has a football game called for lightning. The stadium was evacuated at 6:31 pm. and the game was called shortly after 7:00.
renovation 2010 and beyond
On June 21, 2007, the University Board of Directors approved a $ 226 million renovation (equivalent to $ 259 million in 2016) and an expansion project for the Michigan Stadium. The project included the replacement of several benches, widening alleys and individual seats, installing hand rails, and the addition of new press boxes, 83 luxury squares, and 3,200 club seats. The renovation plan garnered opposition from students, alumni, and fans across the country, which was diminished as renovations approached an external solution.
A veteran-disabled group filed a federal suit against the university on April 17, 2007, alleging that the project design did not meet federal standards for wheelchair-accessible seats. On March 11, 2008, as part of a lawsuit settlement requirement filed against an American-based university with Disabilities Act, the university announced that the stadium's official capacity would be reduced to accommodate wheelchair-accessible seats beginning with Season 2009. The project was completed before the season 2010.
Renovation in April 2008 led to a University of Michigan graduation ceremony that year to be transferred to the Diag.
In August 2011, the University completed a six month scoreboard replacement project; new boards measuring 4,000 sq ft (370 m 2 ) each with a resolution of 900 x 1632.
The Michigan Stadium was inaugurated on September 4, 2010, before the first home football match of Michigan 2010 season against the University of Connecticut, with a registered capacity of 109,901. After the renovation, the stadium has no permanent lights, although the platform for temporary lights is included in the design. In September 2010, a few days after the rededication, the University of Michigan Board of Directors approved the plan to add permanent lamps, at a cost of $ 1.8 million (equivalent to $ 1.98 million in 2016). The lights were first used in men's hockey matches on December 11, 2010. The following season saw the stadium's first night soccer game on September 10, 2011. Wolverines defeated Notre Dame Fighting Irish 35-31.
Michigan's lacrosse program was elevated to NCAA university status in spring 2011, effective in the 2011-12 academic year. The team played most of the 2012 games at the Michigan Stadium, including a game against Ohio State on April 14, 2012, after the annual Wolverine football spring game.
Maps Michigan Stadium
Seating and surface
The original capacity of the stadium was 72,000, but Fielding Yost made sure to install a foothold that could allow for expansion of up to 200,000 seats. Initially, all the seats were made up of wooden benches. It was replaced with a permanent metal seat in 1949 by Fritz Crisler, the athletic director at the time. From 1927 to 1968, the stadium's grounds were covered in natural grass. It was replaced by TartanTurf in 1969 to give players better traction. However, this surface was deemed unforgiving in the player's joints, and the stadium returned to the natural grass in 1991. It also became problematic, because the subsurface location on the surface near the water surface made it difficult for the grass to be permanently rooted. The field was converted to FieldTurf, an artificial surface designed to provide grass-like characteristics, in 2003. In 2010, it was upgraded with a version of a brighter and higher-quality grass field called Duraspine.
Attendance record
Michigan Stadium holds an average home attendance record of one NCAA season, set in 2012 at 112,252 fans per game.
On September 7, 2013, the Michigan Stadium attracted a crowd of 115,109 to see the defeat of Michigan Notre Dame 41-30, which at the time represented the football campus record post-1948 NCAA campus. Prior to that, and prior to NCAA listing for attendance, the Notre Dame-USC 1927 game at Soldier Field in Chicago yielded an estimated 117,000-123,000. These two records fall in 2016 when Tennessee and Virginia Tech withdrew 156,990 for a match held at Bristol Motor Speedway, a NASCAR track with a capacity of over 150,000.
With the presence of 104,173, "The Big Chill in Big House" set the attendance record for hockey matches. The record was broken on January 1, 2014 for the NHL 2014 Winter Classic, where the 105,491 crowd watched the Detroit Red Wings host crash into Toronto Maple Leafs in a shoot-out.
On Saturday 2 August 2014, a sold-out mob of 109,318 watched Manchester United beat Real Madrid 3-1 in an International Champions Cup match. The official attendance figures are the largest for football matches in the United States to date, surpassing the previous record set by the 1984 Golden Olympic Games, when 101,799 saw France beat Brazil 2-0 at the Rose Bowl in Pasadena, California.
Gallery
See also
- List of NCAA Division I football stadiums
- List of stadiums by capacity
References
External links
- Official Michigan Stadium information page
- Renovation of the Michigan Stadium
- Story of Michigan Stadium - Bentley Historical Library, University of Michigan Athletics History
Source of the article : Wikipedia
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