A dress rehearsal game will be held at the new, as yet unnamed, football stadium on Friday (Aug. 17). Spotswood High School will provide the opposition. Fluco Activities Director Scott Morris said that this game will be treated like a regular season contest, as teams will compete in full uniforms and spectators will be charged admission as would be the case for a regular season contest. The first regular season contest will be the following Friday (Aug. 24). The opponent will be Prince Edward County. Morris said that before this game the name for the new stadium will be announced.
The new football stadium is a major improvement from the old field. The seating capacity has been increased to 4,000, and the new stadium has a three-room press box. The old field had a facility that was a press box in name only. As is well known, the new stadium field is an artificial turf field, as opposed to a natural turf, grass field. This means that the new field will be far more functional in inclement weather. Grass fields get muddy and are often unplayable after heavy rain. This artificial turf field will not have that problem, The new stadium also has a field house that contains spotless home and away locker rooms. Morris said that there is a plan to have the football games televised, with students from the school’s radio-TV production class manning up to four TV cameras. This plan is still a work in progress.
In addition to football, the new stadium has also been lined for soccer. The facilities upgrade may be even more striking for the Fluco soccer teams than it is for the football team. The new field will allow the Flucos to play soccer on a regulation size field for the first time. The old field was narrower than regulation and was fairly severely crowned. This is a mild problem for a football wide receiver running an out pattern, but is a more significant problem in soccer, where rolling balls frequently go across the sideline, when they normally would stay in play. Morris also pointed out that the athletic facility also has a grass practice field that is large enough to be lined for a regulation soccer field. Therefore, the school could actually hold two soccer games simultaneously.
Another upgrade in the school’s outdoor athletic facilities is the addition of six high-quality tennis courts. In the past, the Fluco tennis teams were relegated to off-campus facilities. The tennis coaches were always quick to express their appreciation of the fact that the Lake Monticello Owners Association and Camp Friendship allowed their facilities to be used for Fluco tennis. However, it will certainly make things much easier for the boys’ and the girls’ tennis teams, this spring, when they no longer have to schlep their gear off to sites elsewhere in the county.
Another obvious major improvement for Fluco sports teams is indoors. The new high school has a modern gymnasium. The “Shoebox” may have been quaint and cozy, but it was clearly inadequate for Fluco basketball. The Fluco basketball teams will now play in a large, well lit, gym with a capacity of 2,200, more than double the capacity of the old gym. The new facility has three full-length basketball courts, so the girl’s and the boy’s teams will now be able to practice simultaneously, and will not have to alternate practice times. In addition, the new facility will be big enough to allow spectators to come and go from their seats and pass behind the benches. This will be a safety enhancement, as in the past, spectators were often moving in and out on the edges of the court, while the game was in progress.
The Fluco volleyball and wrestling teams, who also compete indoors will also benefit from this new facility. In addition to the main gym, the new building has an upgraded auxiliary gym that will probably have many uses. A new modern weight room will get plenty of use by the school’s football players, but they will certainly not be the only athletes to take advantage of this facility. Now, virtually all athletes have some kind of weight program to enhance their performance.
