109 stadiums & counting (aka, 3 games in 3 days across 3 states, part 1)

For those following along at home, I am on a mission to see all 129 FBS stadiums - eventually this will be all current stadiums, by the by, but for now I am satisfied to say I have seen 111 of them play at home, plus some stadiums only used for bowl games & other special match-ups, like the Red River Rivalry (including all the NFL stadiums along the way, b/c every NFL team has a college team nearby, so you can see both in the same weekend).


For stadiums 109-111, I started with App State on a Thursday night, b/c why waste a weekend on a team only a couple of hours away.  At this point some of you may be thinking, why did you wait so long to see this stadium, dude, if it is only a couple hours away?  Well, that is b/c App State only recently joined the FBS, and this is the first year they are bowl-eligible - b/c I am (a little bit) anal, I have this rule that I won't see new FBS stadiums until they are bowl eligible, b/c what if they don't end up making it in?  Wasted trip, man, wasted trip.

Old Dominion I did see in a transitional year, but that is b/c by special vote, the conference let them be bowl-eligible early.

So App State.  Interesting stadium, seems pretty high school b/c it has the track around it.  Also not fun to drive too over the mountains - lots of fog and near zero visibility in some places along the way.  I will say they are super-green though; they collect and recycle EVERYTHING at the stadium, including pizza boxes, drinking straws, used napkins (which go in the compost pile) as part of thier zero waste program.  They have volunteers all over the stadium who man (or woman) the cans to ensure you put stuff in the right bins.  Good array of food options as well, and nice setting with trees on the one side so it feels a little intimate - check out the review on StadiumJourney.com (I didn't write this one, but I have written reviews of other stadiums on this site, so thought I would help out my fellow writer).

So was the move to FBS good for App State?  Undoubtedly - lots more revenue, and more TV time.  Although I did hear a couple fans say they wished App State was still FCS, b/c then they would never lose!

So that is 109, check back again for parts 2 & 3.