SACRAMENTO, Calif. — Sacramento State University announced plans for a new football and multi-sport stadium featuring at least 25,000 seats, student sections, premium seating and box seats.
Sacramento State is aiming to host collegiate professional and international competitions, NCAA championships, concerts, club sports and other school gatherings like commencement. The multi-sport stadium will also be mapped out to host football, men and women’s soccer and rugby.
The goal is to grow the community and to show school spirit for the student-athletes. With the new stadium, the school hopes to bring student life together through more activities and events that will be offered to the community.
“Hornet Stadium has served this community for many, many, many years, and now, it's time to take it to the next level and build something new. It's a new day for Sacramento State,” said Sacramento State Athletic Director Mark Orr. “We're certainly going to have this stadium used for this entire region and not just our students. Let's not forget, this is gonna have a profound effect on our athletic programs. It is a game changer for us. We are already competing at the highest level. We compete for national championships.”
During the news conference, Sacramento State President Luke Wood didn't say how much this project would cost, the timeline, if the stadium name would change or where teams will play if the stadium isn't completed. However, Wood did say the project wouldn't dip into the general fund.
“That was very important to us as we do this, particularly given the state climate. These are dollars that can only be spent on athletics,” Wood said. “The dollars are coming from co-tenants and sponsorships and donations that those are dollars that are also separate and have very specific uses. So, it will not have an impact on the institution.”
Plans to tear down Hornet Stadium are set to happen once the current football season is completed.
Sacramento State is working with Populous, an architecture firm that has designed stadiums and arenas that are well known today. Some of those include: Yankee Stadium, London Olympics main stadium, Colorado State University football stadium, Target Field and more.
Anastasia Fellines, a resident and film student at Sacramento State, said they hope Sacramento State honors the student's feelings towards this new announcement.
“I had no clue about it, so I was kind of shocked to see that, a little confused too. It's always a sports thing with schools," Fellines said. "It's like we kind of run low on resources and everything, and so it would be nice to kind of see other programs, especially in the arts, get more funding."
Local officials recently launched a committee aimed at helping Sacramento State move to the highest level of college football with hopes of getting an invitation down the road to either the Pac-12 or Mountain West conferences. Wood said these changes needed to be made regardless of a potential conference move for the D1 football school.
“We're part of the Big Sky Conference. We did release a feasibility study showing what it would take if we were to consider a transition. There are a number of things within that feasibility study that we needed to do anyhow,” Wood said. “One of them, and the biggest thing, was our athletic facilities between our plans for our basketball facility, which will be renovated and open in early December.”
Watch More on ABC10: Inderkum High School football player overcomes brain tumor
