FirstBank Stadium, home of the Vanderbilt football team, is currently undergoing a significant renovation. As a result, the Commodores are playing the 2023 college football season on a field directly adjacent to a construction site.
Rather, the field is part of the construction site. Construction will not be finished on the stadium and its surrounding facilities until 2024. Visiting programs have to use a literal makeshift tent as a locker room because the new building is nowhere near completion.
There is a long way to go!
The $300 million investment will also see upgrades to the practice facilities for both the football and basketball teams. Changes to the current football set-up will include:
- 100,000-square-foot indoor practice facility.
- Premium seating and loge boxes.
- Video board and stadium acoustics system.
- Dining facility five times greater in size.
- Stadium concourse doubled in size.
It will be one of the better looking football stadiums in the SEC when it is completed.
Although the job is not done, that doesn’t make the current situation any less jarring from a visual standpoint. Here is how it looked ahead of Saturday’s game against Missouri:
Vanderbilt is not the first team to undergo a significant overhaul to its stadium during the season. This was always the plan.
However, typically, the construction work does not happen as the game is being played. It’s more of a Sunday-Friday thing.
Not in Nashville! Construction was taking place during the SEC matchup.
Vanderbilt scored a touchdown late in the first quarter. Just beyond the end zone was a man wearing his safety vest and hardhat.
It appeared as though the construction worker was just doing some Saturday surveying. He didn’t have any tools or anything like that.
Still, it was rather humorous to see construction taking place as the No. 23-ranked team in the country fell behind 6-3 during a live football game. That might be a first!