Ok, so I know I post a lot about football here, but you have to admit,  I do it with pride. Anyway, just thought I’d share the good news: As of July 1, 2014, the team and staff will have the locker room/facilities/offices that a) we need to be competitive at the IA level and b) they have deserved for quite a while.

Since Bill and I have been here, the facilities have been, shall we say, less than stellar.

Any guesses as to why we called this place the bunker?

Bill’s old office, converted to a meeting room after the temporary move.

The new building will have a Hall of Fame instead of just a wall dedicated to past champions.

Honestly, you can tell team meetings were never really intended to be held here, can’t you?

For decades, we had a facility that was, shall we say, unique. It was a big, one-story cinderblock building. My husband’s office was an oversized storage closet, and the roof in the visitor’s locker room leaked for years even after the roof was replaced. There were no real team meeting rooms because there was a seperate athletic facility across campus that housed the official offices, weight room and meeting areas; this lead to some position meetings being held in the bathroom hallways. There was no air conditioning, which made post-practice work in the summer even more unbearable, and I always worried about Bill getting dehydrated while cutting tape. Needless to say, even though it was terribly rough around the edges, it was our home for nearly 50 years, and it was hard to say goodbye to it. In 2012, the offices moved to a temporary location up the road;  with every goodbye comes a hello, though and groundbreaking on the new building began that spring. After two years of construction, we’re down to the last month before it’s complete.

The new locker room under construction

The head coach’s office

I’m glad that the media has the pressbox facilities they need to effectively broadcast our games. I’m excited for the coaches and players, because it says that the university and community are dedicated to seeing UMass Football become a nationally recognized team, which, considering how college football in New England isn’t embraced nearly the way it is in other part of the country, is certainly something to be proud of. However,  what makes me the happiest, may just be the one thing that makes me look like a HUGE dork:

What’s that behind Bill?!?!

My husband will, after 23 years, finally have an office with not one, but TWO floor to ceiling windows!

#GoUmass #FireTheMusket #BeatBC