42 Million $$ Budget approved for Love's Field for OU Softball

[OUBeliever56A]

This article was released on June 21, I missed it, but noticed it yesterday on Oklahoma's Softball page concerning the construction of Love's Field.

https://soonersports.com/news/2022/6/21 ... udget.aspx

Here are a few key passages for the Stadium.

1) To date, $28 million of the $42 million has been raised for the project and has come from over 800 donors, including the $12 million lead gift from Love's Travel Stops. Love's Travel Stops' original pledge was $9 million, and the company agreed to match every other donation dollar for dollar up to an additional $3 million. OU Athletics donors quickly unlocked the challenge match and have continued to support this project with over $5 million raised since the Love's Field announcement on Oct. 28, 2021.

Unrolling the history of the giving it looks like this. Prior to the Love's initial donation, there had been $8 Million donated towards a new softball stadium that had been given. Then the announcement of the new Love's Field occurred in October of 2021. The Love's initial gift of $9 Million for the new stadium raised the total given for the new stadium to $17 Million. At the time, the budget announced for the new Love's Field was $27 Million. In addition to the initial gift by Love's, they also announced an additional 'match gift' of $3 Million to be made when the next $3 Million was donated by Oklahoma fans to the stadium. That occurred fairly quickly and the total given became $23 Million. Per the article released today, $5 Million more has been raised towards the new stadium. That makes the total raised to $28 Million. But the budget approved today was for a spectacular $42 Million Love's Field Stadium. That leaves $14 Million to go for the Stadium to be paid in full. It is fairly amazing that the project costs has raised $15 Million since the announcement of the project.

2) When will the ground breaking for Love's Field occur?

Love's Field groundbreaking is expected to occur in the coming months.

3) Season Tickets and Selection of Tickets process.

With an initial seating capacity of 3,000, the OU Athletics Department will begin the season ticket sales and seat selection process for Love's Field in the coming months.

OU will utilize an online 3D seat map of Love's Field to assist OU softball fans in selecting their seats. Current OU softball season ticket holders will have first priority and will be placed in Sooner Point order to determine seat selection times.

Next, all fans on the softball season ticket wait list as of June 20 will be placed in Sooner Point order and have the opportunity to select seats as availability exists.

A deposit process for all fans not in one of the of the two aforementioned groups has been created. Fans who make a $100 per seat deposit will be in the third priority group and will be assigned a seat selection time based on their Sooner Points within that group. Season tickets are subject to availability and making a deposit does not guarantee access to season tickets. Individuals interested in making a seat deposit should visit www.soonersports.com or call the OU Athletics Ticket Office at 405-325-2424 or the Sooner Club at 405-325-8000.

More information on the seating chart and season ticket pricing plan for Love's Field will be released as it is finalized.

Process:

A) Current OU softball season ticket holders will have first priority and will be placed in Sooner Point order to determine seat selection times.

To me, this reads like if you currently have season tickets (reserved and general admission ???) that you will be in the first group to be contacted for season tickets for Love's Field. that process will begin in the coming months.

B) all fans on the softball season ticket wait list as of June 20 will be placed in Sooner Point order and have the opportunity to select seats as availability exists.

This indicated that all fans on the current season ticket 'wait list' will be placed in Sooner Point order and will have the opportunity to select seats if availability exists.

C) A deposit process for all fans not in one of the of the two aforementioned groups has been created. Fans who make a $100 per seat deposit will be in the third priority group and will be assigned a seat selection time based on their Sooner Points within that group.

If you are not a current season ticket holder, you need to consider if you wish to be a season ticket holder. If so, you need to call and get on the 'wait list' for season tickets. To get on the wait list, you will need to provide a deposit to be added to the 'wait list'. the deposit is $100 doe each seat you wish. As that list is created, the group on the new 'wait list' will be placed in Sooner Point order to obtain seats as they become available.

Boomer Sooner!

[1KCSoonerFan]

I am pumped about this project....and have too many questions.

Could it be that not all of the money budgeted will be spent? The project may cost 'up to' $42M? Maybe they are anticipating overruns (like most big projects seem to do) and budgeting some of that into their pre-build calculations.

I think I read somewhere that there was also an individual family that made a sizable donation (I forgot their name)? It was 'only' like a million bucks, though...LOL!

Do you think 3,000 seats is enough? I wondered what the potential benefits and risks were to starting with, say, 5,000 capacity. Wonder what the break-even point is. Does OU softball make money now? (I don't know what kinds of agreements OU and OKC have with each other as far as who gets what. However, would the new stadium host some money-making tournaments, camps, etc. for additional revenue?)

HCPG spoke about her extensive touring of other top facilities to see what great ideas were out there. She then cherry-picked the best ones and incorporated them into the design. That would have been a fun shopping trip!

This is such a huge momentum-builder for OUSB as well as the sport.

[1KCSoonerFan]

Oh, and I would love to see a Heisman-like park somewhere on the grounds.

[OU_Tom]

3000 isn't nearly big enough. They could sell closer to 10000 tickets a game

[1KCSoonerFan]

I am thinking the same way about seating being more than 3K! That seems way too low. I wonder how they arrived at 3K and not 10K?

- Scarcity insures sold out crowds?
- Scarcity insures a solid base-line ticket price and predictable cash-flow?
- 3K is what the research indicated for this "market"?
- 3K is all they can afford at this moment?

There is a REASON (or reasoning) behind it. Would be a great interview with Joe C. about this.

I can't imagine what a 10K stadium, packed full of enthusiastic fans every game, would do for OU and the sport! It would rival OKC and many other venues around the country!

[TN Sooner]

I saw an interview with Patty shortly after Loves was announced. In it, she said she had talked to Joe about temporary expansion to 4000 or so. I don’t know if this is possible with the final design, but I think 3000 is fine for regular season and ability to expand by 1000 for postseason or big series would be great.

[OU_Tom]

While I did suggest that the stadium should be 10000 seats, I would like to point out that someone has to pay for it. Lots of donors have contributed to expand the stadium to 3,000 seats; I am grateful to each and everyone of them.

OU will be moving to SEC within a couple of years. The new stadium will have an average capacity for an SEC school so I am sure that OU will have to keep up with the Jones (and the SEC) and work on expanding.

I imagine that OU softball is much more popular than any OU Sport than football.

[AustinTXSooner]

A look at SEC softball stadium capacities. 3,000 seats would put OU second in the SEC behind Alabama. Where you see two numbers below, the first number does NOT include berm/grass seating, the second number does. I'm sure that more schools have grass seating, they just didn't list the numbers separately.

School	Capacity
OU	1378
Texas	1252
Alabama	3940
Florida	2800
Auburn	2316
Tennessee	2200
Texas A&M	2000
Georgia	2000
LSU	1711/2671
Missouri	1600/2600
Kentucky	1417/1917
South Carolina	1277
Arkansas	1200
Mississippi St	1100
Mississippi	1000

[1KCSoonerFan]

Thanks for the list of other stadium capacities.

Looks like 3K (with expansion capabilities) fits OU's peer group. Perhaps that is the main factor in deciding seats.

I always liked the idea of Home Run Village (which can be a huge flex-capacity option): It's free, they have stuff for the kids to do, and you can bring a picnic if you want.

[Bixby_Sooner]

While I did suggest that the stadium should be 10000 seats, I would like to point out that someone has to pay for it. Lots of donors have contributed to expand the stadium to 3,000 seats; I am grateful to each and everyone of them.

OU will be moving to SEC within a couple of years. The new stadium will have an average capacity for an SEC school so I am sure that OU will have to keep up with the Jones (and the SEC) and work on expanding.

I imagine that OU softball is much more popular than any OU Sport than football.

While I agree that they could fill a much larger stadium right now, (I'm not sure about the 10k), the real test of how big the facility should be will come when PG retires. I think 3,000 with the capability of expanding for playoffs would be the best for our current and future situation.

I did see artist conception of the new baseball stadium. They have a number of green areas (similar to planters) along the 1st and 3rd line that can be removed and seats installed in those areas for future expansion (I don't have any idea on how many seats can be installed). In the mean time, they can be used for folding chairs and blankets on the ground for overflow crowds. Maybe there are plans for something like this for Love's Field. Has anyone seen any artist renderings?

[OUBeliever56A]

The drawing of new Love's Field does allow for temporary seating in the outfield and along 1st and 3rd base lines. Something like a 1000 to 1500 temporary seats can be added for playoffs or other series.

[TropicalSooner]

So that would temporarily increase our crowds to 4,000-4,500. Nice!
I wonder if we would still have a HomeRun Village kind of thingy or if the add'l seating would accomodate everyone........