Villanova Stadium is a 12,500 seat

stadium A stadium ( : stadiums or stadia) is a place or venue for (mostly) outdoor sports, concerts, or other events and consists of a field or stage either partly or completely surrounded by a tiered structure designed to allow spectators to stand o ...

located on the campus of

Villanova University Villanova University is a Private university, private Catholic church, Roman Catholic research university in Villanova, Pennsylvania. It was founded by the Order of Saint Augustine, Augustinians in 1842 and named after Thomas of Villanova, Sa ...

Villanova, Pennsylvania Villanova is a suburb of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. It straddles Lower Merion Township in Montgomery County and Radnor Township in Delaware County. It is located at the center of the Philadelphia Main Line, a series of Philadelphia suburbs lo ...

, USA.

History

Villanova Stadium was originally built in 1927 and dedicated on October 8, 1927. The stadium plays host to a wide variety of events including serving as home to the

Villanova Wildcats football The Villanova Wildcats football program represents Villanova University in the NCAA Division I Football Championship Subdivision (FCS, known as Division I-AA until 2006). The Wildcats compete in the Colonial Athletic Association for football only. ...

field hockey Field hockey is a team sport structured in standard hockey format, in which each team plays with ten outfield players and a goalkeeper. Teams must drive a round hockey ball by hitting it with a hockey stick towards the rival team's shooting ci ...

lacrosse Lacrosse is a team sport played with a lacrosse stick and a lacrosse ball. It is the oldest organized sport in North America, with its origins with the indigenous people of North America as early as the 12th century. The game was extensively ...

, and

track and field Track and field is a sport that includes athletic contests based on running, jumping, and throwing skills. The name is derived from where the sport takes place, a running track and a grass field for the throwing and some of the jumping events ...

teams. Philadelphia area teams such as the WUSA's

Philadelphia Charge The Philadelphia Charge was an American women's professional soccer team that played in the Women's United Soccer Association. The team played at Villanova Stadium on the campus of Villanova University near Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. History ...

and

Major League Lacrosse Major League Lacrosse (MLL) was a men's field lacrosse league in the United States. The league's inaugural season was in 2001. Teams played anywhere from ten to 16 games in a summertime regular season. This was followed by a four-team playoff ...

Philadelphia Barrage The Philadelphia Barrage were a field lacrosse team that are based in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, and member of Major League Lacrosse. They were the Bridgeport Barrage from 2001 to 2003 at The Ballpark at Harbor Yard in Bridgeport, Connecticut. T ...

have also used the stadium in the past or currently. In the 1960s, Monsignor Bonner High School, like Villanova an Augustinian school, used the field. The field and track at Villanova Stadium are known as "Goodreau Field" and "Jumbo Elliott Track," respectively. On May 7, 1930, the playing field at Villanova Stadium was dedicated to the memory of Leo J. Francis Goodreau, a Villanova football player who died due to injuries incurred in practice. On September 27, 1980, the running track was dedicated to Villanova's legendary

coach James "Jumbo" Elliott.

Renovations

In Fall 1999, the stadium underwent a face-lift with the Stadium Renovation Project. Included in this project was a state of the art press box, in addition to housing an 80-person meeting room for all Villanova Athletic Department personnel to use. The former

AstroTurf AstroTurf is an American subsidiary of SportGroup that produces artificial turf for playing surfaces in sports. The original AstroTurf product was a short-pile synthetic turf invented in 1965 by Monsanto. Since the early 2000s, AstroTurf has m ...

playing field was replaced during the spring of 2002 with a synthetic grass surface known as AstroPlay. In Fall 2009, the stadium received a new scoreboard along with a new playing surface. In 2016, a new football operations building, the Andrew J. Talley Athletic Center, which also serves as the training room for the sports programs at the school, opened, named for the school's first head coach since the May 1984 reinstatement of the program until the end of 2016.

References

External links

* {{Pennsylvania college football venues Buildings and structures in Delaware County, Pennsylvania College football venues College lacrosse venues in the United States Former Major League Lacrosse venues Athletics (track and field) venues in Pennsylvania College track and field venues in the United States Soccer venues in Pennsylvania Villanova Wildcats football Lacrosse venues in the United States Sports venues completed in 1927 College field hockey venues in the United States 1927 establishments in Pennsylvania

History

Renovations

See also

References

External links