Lights, Camera, Action! History Will Be Made at Brown Stadium.
Sunday, May 02, 2010
The Brown University Football program has had a lot of firsts. In 1878, they played their first game of intercollegiate football at Amherst. On January 1, 1916, they played in the first Rose Bowl in Pasadena against Washington State. On Saturday, September 25, 2010 they will experience another first: Brown will play its first-ever night game at home when they host the Harvard Crimson in their Ivy League opener.
Brown coach Phil Estes made the official announcement Saturday following his teams Brown/White Spring game and the gathering of Brown football supporters was thrilled. “This is a big event for our program,” Estes said. “I’ve always enjoyed playing games under the lights like we have at Harvard our past two times there and even at Stony Brook last year. There’s something special about it.”
Even though there are no lights at Brown Stadium, there will be on that night. Portable lights will be trucked in to illuminate the field and the stands for what should be an electric atmosphere. “We always draw well for Harvard when they come here,” he said. “Now instead of 10-thousand for this game, we hope to draw 20-thousand fans to Brown Stadium and sell it out.”
Estes is by far the best coach in Brown football history leading the program to 3 Ivy League titles in his 12 seasons there. He has also sent more players to the NFL than any Ivy program over the last decade with four of his former players having won Super Bowl rings. Still, this first for his program has him all fired up. “When I told my players after practice Friday the locker room erupted,” he said. “I really think that this can be great for us all season. Brown students usually sleep until 1 o’clock on Saturday’s so now they can start their night with us at Brown Stadium. After they see how exciting Brown football can be hopefully they’ll be coming back for future games.”
There once was a time decades ago that Brown football games would regularly draw 15 to 20-thousand fans per game. That was back before the advent of cable television when going to a college football game was the thing to do on a Saturday in the fall. The hope now is that for one fall night this September, Brown Stadium will be filled to capacity once again and fans will not only be treated to a great Ivy League rivalry but also to be a part of Brown football history.
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