The massive video boards that adorn most sports venues — from high school fields to professional stadiums — have become as essential and ubiquitous to sporting events as televisions are in most homes. Many fans who attend a live sporting event end up watching a good portion of the game on the venue’s massive screen. These modern replacements for the traditional scoreboard offer a closer view of the action on the field or court, as well as instant replays, advertisements, in-game trivia, kiss-cams and other opportunities for crowd engagement.
Today, high schools and colleges across the country are investing in new video boards for a variety of reasons, but the main goal is almost always to improve the fan experience. Here’s a look at how and why one high school and one college decided to up their home-field advantage by investing in new video boards for their football stadiums.
Photo courtesy of Daktronics
Community momentum
Many high schools in Utah had already switched over to video boards when Jessica McCurdy, executive director of the Park City Passing League, a parent group that supports local youth and prep football, decided it was time for a change at Park City High School’s Dozier Field.
“We went to other games away from our home field, and we all just noticed that a lot of the schools had started using video boards,” McCurdy says. “Our facilities at Park City High definitely needed an upgrade, and so we, as parents, and our nonprofit Park City Passing League really felt like that was something that we could fundraise for and that the community could get behind. And so that was why we kind of chose that project.”
The group figured they would need to raise around $200,000 to fund the project, and parents immediately figured out what funding levels they would offer the community.
“We just started putting it out to the community and asking significant donors based on people in the community, saying, ‘Let’s try these people. Let’s try these people,’ ” explains McCurdy. “Vail Resorts, which we actually recognize as Park City Mountain, they were definitely behind it. They were one of our biggest donors. And the Park Record, which is our local newspaper, they were behind it right away, as well. So, we were very fortunate that the project fit with their donations.”
Given Park City athletic director Jamie Sheetz’s previous relationship with Daktronics, Park City decided to go with that company as the vendor on the project. Park City purchased a 13-by-24-foot board that features a 15-millimeter resolution. Everything runs on Daktronics’ Show Control software system, and Park City chose to add Framewrx, an online content platform specifically designed for easy content creation using professionally designed templates.
McCurdy says that once the fundraising piece had been taken care of, installation moved rather quickly. “We weren’t expecting it to go that fast, but we were in kind of a time crunch because of our weather,” she says. “We wanted to get it in before spring, so as soon as we were able to at least know that funds were coming in and get our deposit in, they were able to order the scoreboard and start working on the installation, and it all went very quickly.”
According to McCurdy, a lot of businesses showed their support because the board is now being used as an advertising channel, but the lure of a new video board went beyond a financial return on investment. “We have a program called PC CAPS at the high school,” she says. “Our goal is to actually offer it in the curriculum where the high school kids can start running the board. But then there are also things like live streaming that we can do with it, and if someone scores a touchdown, we can immediately get their photo on the scoreboard — interactive stuff like that.”
Having a massive video board — essentially a movie screen — at Dozier Field also offers opportunities beyond sporting events. “They used it to show a movie for a senior event before graduation,” McCurdy says. “And then our actual high school graduation was live streamed up on the board. It just really checks all the boxes. It improves the experiences at games, it’s an educational tool and it really kind of brings the community together and engages them.”
Photo courtesy of Austin Commercial
Texas big
The University of Houston had already planned on tearing up part of TDECU Stadium as part of a $130 million improvement project — almost the same amount the school spent when building the 40,000-seat venue back in 2014 — and UH decided it made sense to go all in with a new, much larger video board.
TJ Meagher, senior associate athletics director at Houston, says adding the new video board, which was an engineering feat in and of itself, was a no-brainer. “When you think about the in-venue experience for our fans, it’s driven by the action on the field, but the entertainment aspect of the fan experience, that’s heavily influenced by the video board and the sound system,” says Meagher. “Those have a tendency to fill in the gaps around the game and keep the energy level high.”
Given the new board’s massive size — 44.5 feet tall by 160 feet wide, compared to the previous board at 43 feet tall by 68 feet wide — Cougars fans will not have to squint to see the score or catch replays on what could be one of the biggest displays in college football. The new board also has a 10-millimeter resolution, which is an improvement from the 15-millimeter resolution of the stadium’s previous board. The display is capable of variable content zoning, meaning it can show multiple windows of content to fit the operator’s needs. This includes any combination of live video, instant replays, up-to-the-minute statistics and game information, graphics, animations and sponsorship messages.
Supplementing the main video display is a long, narrow ribbon display that was also added to the stadium renovation plans. This display measures roughly 2.5 feet high by 234 feet long and features the same 10-millimeter pixel spacing as the main board. The ribbon allows operators to show additional statistics, graphics and game information, while also allowing the university to highlight its partners and sponsors throughout events.
Don Barnum, architect for DLR Group, which led the stadium upgrade project at Houston, explains that the main video board was exactly what was needed to complement the rest of the project in the stadium’s west end zone. “On a number of levels, just as part of the composition of the building, the size and shape of that board make the difference. It is a massive, visually impactful piece of the composition of elements in the end zone,” says Barnum. “When you look at it, it’s as big as all the seating in front of it combined.”
Barnum says the initial stadium was built with expansion in mind, and that allowed architects to more easily integrate the new video board into the existing facility. “Essentially it’s right over the concourse of what was already there, so it’s already integrated into the building,” explains Barnum. “The structure comes through the existing concourse and through our three levels of new premium stuff. It’s a common structure with the rest of the building frame, and the building frame actually helps take away some of the lateral load, at least to the roof of the building. It’s not cantilevering from zero to 100 feet. It’s only cantilevering from 60 to 100 feet, so that actually helps the rigidity of that frame.”
A primary logistical challenge with the west end zone project — the premium suites and concourses won’t open until 2025 — was that Houston couldn’t afford to be without a scoreboard, or have the stadium closed, through the 2024 football season. “We took over the stadium for construction in December of ’23, and the scoreboard will be operational for this year’s football season,” Barnum explains. “The rest of the building will not be done until August of ’25. But it was imperative that they didn’t lose their scoreboard for a year. So steel was procured early, construction on the foundations and steel started early, and the display obviously had to get up during the summer months to be ready. None of this was a light undertaking. All of it had to be very well thought out. From design all the way through the execution, it was important that the stadium stay in use throughout the ’24 season, so we could have a football season.”
Meagher says he wishes every fan and community member knew what went into installing the main video board. “It’s disappointing that most people won’t know what was involved in getting that board up, and what’s under the concourse to stabilize this large structure. It is a massive-grade beam that’s really based on the weight to hold that board in place, and it’s designed to withstand a Category 3 hurricane wind.”
When asked whether planners ever considered going ahead with the premium upgrades without investing in a new video board, Meagher says it just made sense to make the upgrade as part of the project. “Given the work we were doing in that area of the stadium, it really was the best opportunity to open it up, rework the base and be able to add this type of structure. I’m really happy that this was a priority in the project, that this mattered. We needed to do this for the fans.”
As in Park City, the board in Houston won’t just be used for football. A screen that big demands to be used in the service of the greater campus community whenever possible. “We have done watch parties with the previous board, and we’ll do more with this one. We played on the road and opened up the stadium to students and fans to be able to watch it, you know, sitting on a blanket,” says Meagher. “It’s a large TV, so ultimately, by getting that 16-9 aspect ratio, you can pretty much project anything you want through the system and put it on the display.”
Regardless of the size of the venue — a small high school looking to give the fans a little more sparkle on Friday nights, or a D-I university endeavoring to pull off a feat of engineering in the interest of the fan experience — video boards are here to stay in increasingly big ways at all levels of competition.
Meagher will even admit that in some cases, the board steals the show. “I know some people go to indoor venues, and depending on what the focus is, most people just watch the video board,” he says. “They don’t even look at what they’re there to see live.”
