103 stadiums and counting

For those of you following along, I am trying to visit all 129 FBS football stadiums (I include UAB b/c it is coming back, I don't yet include Coastal Carolina since they are not yet FBS).  And on that note, what I am technically trying to do is see every FBS play at home; I don't count bowl games or conference championship games that happen to be played at the same stadium, I only count it when I see the home team play there.



You can check out reviews I have written for some of them here (yes this is a shameless plug - I get half a cent per page view, so please read them twice).
http://www.stadiumjourney.com/member/Aaron%20S.%20Terry

So stadium #103 was Aggie Memorial Stadium in Las Cruces, NM.  Not a bad stadium, but NMSU is an absolutely terrible team - they have only had 5 wins since 2012 (as of this writing), and haven't had a winning season since 2002, which is as far back as ESPN's data goes.  The game I went to (Sept 19, 2015) was awesome, an OT thriller and back and forth battle with all kinds of scoring - the game was against their nearby rival UTEP (an annual match-up dubbed the Battle of I-10), and the final score was 50-47.  NMSU was up by a little, then lost the lead, only to retake it, back and forth, back and forth all day, but the Aggies just couldn't get it done in the end, even though they led for most of the game.

Perhaps true to form, given their record in the past few years, NMSU lost a 2 TD lead TWICE in the 4th quarter - at the end of the 3rd, NMSU was up by 14, only to have UTEP come back and tie it, then NMSU scored 2 TDs, only to have UTEP come back and tie it AGAIN to force the game into over time (42 points scored in the 4th quarter compared to 46 scored in quarters 1-3).  NMSU went three and out in OT, and had to settle for a field goal, and then lost when UTEP scored a TD.

You can read more about the stadium here (the reviews I write are all about the stadium, for example the food, the seats, the atmosphere, etc. not so much about the game):

http://www.stadiumjourney.com/stadiums/aggie-memorial-stadium-s378

The north end zone is pretty unique, sort of like a rock garden theme with desert plants, and the "A" on the mountains overlooking is pretty cool - this is a common thing out west, for example, BYU has a "Y", Utah has a "U", etc.  In fact, in Utah even some of the high schools do it, which is maybe a little pompous but whatever - the mountains are pretty boring after a while so may as well add some pop, even if it is only a giant white letter.

So that is stadium #103 - check back for more as the season progresses; I am desperately hoping to get to the mid-teens by the end of this year.