SMU broke ground today on a fancier home corral for the SMU Mustangs football team—putting the first digs on a $100 million, 192,500-square-foot end zone expansion.
If you’ve driven past SMU’s Gerald J. Ford Stadium on Mockingbird Lane, you may have noticed it’s more or less horseshoe-shaped, with no end zone on the stadium’s southern end. That may be appropriate for a horse-themed team, but it lessened the boom of fan roars and didn’t quite live up to the school’s storied football past.
Not for long.
As we wrote last January, the Garry Weber Foundation gave $50 million toward the construction of a three-tiered end zone complex for the stadium. Weber, a 1958 SMU alum and former Mustang football player, is the founder, chairman, and CEO of Dallas-based Weber Financial, Inc.
To be packed with features and facilities
[Photo: SMU]
The Garry Weber End Zone Complex will include a team auditorium, new locker rooms, a weight room, meeting rooms, and a full kitchen and training table for SMU’s 484 student-athletes. Football coaches, support staff, and video and recruiting services will also get space inside.
Today’s groundbreaking marks the beginning of phase two of SMU’s fundraising drive for the expansion, which launched in January with Weber’s gift—the largest in SMU Athletics history.
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The gift by Weber, a 1958 alum and former Mustang football player, is the largest in the history of the SMU Athletic Department. It launches a $100M facility drive to build the 192,500-SF complex—which will house a team auditorium, new locker rooms, a weight room, position-specific meeting rooms, and more.
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