THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Thursday, April 4, 1996 TAG: 9604040535
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: C1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: TOM ROBINSON
LENGTH: Medium: 64 lines
This agitated look came over Dick Price's face. And as the decibel level of his voice grew within his Norfolk State athletic director's office, you knew the man was hearing tubas, no doubt about it.
Hearing and seeing trumpets. Big bass drums, pounding along a parade route down Brambleton Ave. to Corprew, alumni and football fans in green and gold dancing as they passed.
A dream. No, a vision. Price was off in a fall 1997 fantasy, a crisp Saturday afternoon procession, 30,000 filing into Norfolk State's new on-campus stadium, the smoke of grilled meats from the parking lots flavoring the air, the Spartans ready to play for the championship of the Mid-Eastern Athletic Conference.
Such possibilities. So close to touching. Oh yeah. Oh yeah.
``I'm EXCITED right now,'' Price boomed, and his laugh rumbled off walls that know Price comes by his emotions honestly.
Thirty years ago, Price coached Norfolk State football teams that played on a modest field where the new stadium will be. He coached a national championship track team that had no track, and still had none before that part of Norfolk State's ambitious $16 million sports complex was completed last year.
Now the rest of the facelift - including new baseball and softball fields - is on the way, a fact Norfolk State will ceremoniously mark this morning at 11 when ground is broken to finish the football stadium.
A grandstand for 4,200, light towers and a two-level press and VIP box already hover over the track and football field. Enveloping it all with 26,000 more seats in the next 1 1/2 years is the final phase of the project inspired by Norfolk State's pending move from Division II to Division I.
The move-in date is Sept. 6, 1997, the season-opener against Virginia State that will mark the end of rent payments on Old Dominion's crotchety Foreman Field. The end of fans and athletes trundling across town to adopted headquarters.
And more important, the beginning of critical strides for the entire university as a new century approaches - setting down roots, bringing new friends in and welcoming back old ones.
``It'll give our fans a sense of being home,'' said football coach Darnell Moore, standing at midfield on a blustery, blue-sky day.
Moore totes the biggest ticket onto Norfolk State's Division I wagon. It will be football in Division I-AA, actually, but with much greater financial and recruiting pressures than Division II.
He is ready. The stadium, Norfolk State's entry into the far-flung MEAC, the production ofpossibly three NFL draft picks this month, are on memos to recruits.
In his vision, though, Moore doesn't hear tubas and drums. He hears the roar of Spartan fans straining to blunt an opponent's third-down thrust with their voices. He's heard it before, just as Price has seen a few parades.
But they know the sights and sounds are somehow going to be different, keener, better. Something about pride. The pride of ownership.
``When people are defending their turf, it's a lot different defending something that's really yours instead of somebody else's,'' Moore said. ``You lay everything on the line in a situation like that.''
They'll turn some of that turf today, a day for dreams and visions at Norfolk State. And maybe even a tailgate party. Just for practice. by CNB