In 2005, Miami University added new bleachers to Yager Stadium, finishing a three-year project to renovate the home of RedHawks football.
The project began in 2003 with the addition of a FieldTurf athletic field as well as broadcast-quality lighting and a new scoreboard.
In 2004, the Cradle of Coaches plaza near the south end of the stadium was erected, and finally in 2005 Miami added new bleachers to the student sections located at both the east sideline and behind the north end zone.
It was the largest renovations project since the stadium was built in 1983.
However, now there is major project being undertaken by Miami as a part of the For Love and Honor Campaign: Funds are being secured to build a new indoor practice facility behind the bleachers in the north end zone.
"The For Love and Honor Campaign is a fund-raising campaign that's going through our bicentennial," Athletic Director Brad Bates said. "It started about five years ago and departments throughout campus have financial goals that they're trying to reach. And the indoor practice facility is one of the (goals) for athletics."
Football Head Coach Shane Montgomery said that an indoor practice facility would help the team practice in the offseason when conditions don't allow for outdoor practices.
"Right now in the months of January, February, March-before we start ball when it's not nice outside-we can't get this team outside and get any work done, so obviously that'd be a great facility to help us through the offseason," Montgomery said. "The biggest thing has been, our last three of four winters have been pretty bad as far as a lot of snow, a lot of cold weather, and our kids don't have anywhere to go to throw the football, to run around, to do things like that."
Although it would be called a practice facility, it wouldn't only host practices. Montgomery believes that an addition like The Barn-which what the new facility is being termed-would be a selling point for high school players Miami is trying to recruit.
"Obviously it helps with recruiting," Montgomery said. "You see a facility like that that allows the players to work 12 months year round, no matter what the weather is outside."
The football team isn't the only team that would benefit from the indoor practice facility, as both the baseball and softball teams would be able to practice indoors year round.
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"For us it gives us a chance-a lot of it is depending on how it's actually done-but it gives us a chance to do drills, and fundamentals, to hit in there, do inter-squad in there," Baseball Head Coach Dan Simonds said. "It will really help because January and February are the two biggest months to get our team ready, and there are a lot of days we're in Withrow Court, and it's limited. You can only take so many balls off of a wood floor."
The Barn would have the ability to host, not only practices, but intramural events as well. The idea behind it is not only to allow varsity athletics to hold practices that would otherwise be cancelled, but to allow both club and intramural sports to use it to host events that would also be cancelled due to inclement weather.
"We'll have netting so that golf will benefit from it, field hockey, soccer, all the sports that compete on a field and even some of the other sports that do conditioning and need a surface of some sort to run on," Bates said. "So I think it's something that will really be beneficial, not only to the athletic department, but to the student body."
Right now the Athletic Department has had the architects who designed the past Yager renovations draw up designs for The Barn. The department is in the process of deciding what facilities would exactly be built behind Yager.
Bates said that once the scope of the project has been determined, the project, which would be funded completely by private donors, would have alumni give money toward construction.
Since the project hasn't been finalized yet, Bates doesn't know exactly how much The Barn renovations would cost, however, Bates is confident the money would eventually be secured, through private donations and fund raising.
"Several alums have already told me that they are very interested in giving towards the project," Bates said. "We just need to make sure we have the scope of the project down."
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