Moody Coliseum is now projected to be finished by February, according to Kevin Campbell, senior vice president for operations.
The project overall has gone very smoothly despite hiccups in shipping and weather delays. Currently, the locker rooms are ahead of schedule, however the seating bowl continues to be behind schedule.
“It is hard to project when we will open up the seating bowl,” Campbell said.
As well, the HVAC system is also currently behind schedule due to the shipping delay. Despite this, some athletes were already able to see the progress on their new coliseum in which they will call home.
“We have always talked about opening in two phases,” Campbell said.“Those two phases will start with opening up the seating bowl, which we are hoping for February, the second event will be the project completion which is still scheduled for the summer of 2022.”
The first projected event in the new Moody Coliseum is a basketball game or chapel, depending on scheduling of the games. Following this, Campbell hopes that Sing Song and graduation will then follow.
“The aim of this project is to have several basketball games, Sing Song, and graduation,” Campbell said.”We also want to reopen chapel in some capacity, the first event will most likely be a basketball game or chapel.”
Athletes recently were able to tour the construction site, due to the locker rooms being ahead of schedule. Kamryn Mraz, a senior basketball player and psychology major from Rodgers, was able to walk through the locker rooms.
“I think the new Moody is definitely going to help our season,” Mraz said. “Getting in the new Moody will provide extra point emphasis on protecting our home court and make our fans proud.”
Despite the challenges, Moody is still expected to be fully opened to full capacity in the summer of 2022. Campbell is grateful on how smoothly the project has gone.
“Overall we are super pleased with how things are going,” Campbell said. “We knew early on that this has been an extremely challenging project and with having a very tight schedule. The construction and the design team have rallied to it and solving the obstacles.”
