After half an hour, the mob of Iowa fans on the field at the Hubert H. Humphrey Metrodome had to leave. Had to. It was up to Minneapolis’ Metropolitan Sports Facilities Commission to remove them. The Commission tried to get rid of the Hawkeye faithfuls in order to avert further humiliation for the Metrodome. But the fans wouldn’t budge. In fact, the swarm celebrating the Hawkeye’s 45-21 drubbing of Minnesota, and a Big Ten championship, went even further. The went all the way to the end of the field, as one fan after another grabbed hold of the towering goal posts, until they gave way to gravity. With the thud on the Fieldturf, the Facilities Commission was sure a riot was about to ensue between the remaining Golden Gopher fans, and the opposition. The commission was appalled at the actions of the Hawkeye fans. No team, especially in the Big Ten, comes into an opponent’s house, clobbers them, and proceeds to tear down the home teams goal posts. Not without a fight at least. But there was one slight problem: Not one Golden Gopher fan cared enough to step on the field. ‘The fans didn’t move,’ said Jake Murphy, president of the Goal Line Club, Minnesota’s football booster club. ‘It wasn’t a big deal to us, because the Dome and the goal posts belonged to the commission, not us. We didn’t feel as if that was ours, but now with our own place that would never happen again.’ With that inaction back in 2002, a message was sent – it was about time for Minnesota football to find a new home. After 27 years in the Metrodome, the brand new outdoor TCF Bank Stadium will serve as that home for the Golden Gopher program. The state-of-the-art 50,700-seat facility broke ground on Sept. 30, 2006 and will open its doors on Sept. 12, when Minnesota plays host to Air Force. The Stadium will have the largest locker room in all of professional and collegiate football, to go along with the third largest video board in Division I. It will also be the first new stadium for any Big Ten school in 49 years. It is a stark change of scenery for a team desperately seeking one. ‘We aren’t going to lose anything from the Metrodome,’ said Garrett Brown, Minnesota’s standout defensive tackle. ‘Football is about playing outdoors. It’s great for fans, the team, and of course for the student body, because now it can connect with us again.’ On Saturday Aug. 22, a little preview into that connection between the campus community and the football team was on display as the Golden Gophers played for the first time on the field at TCF Bank stadium. The team conducted a ‘mock game-day’ in front of football season ticket holders. Fans occupied roughly half the stadium, but despite the fact that the game was an exhibition, and the stands were far from sold out, the experience was like nothing Murphy and other fans ever had at the Metrodome. ‘The atmosphere was better than it’s ever been at the Metrodome,’ Murphy said. ‘I even saw people putting on sunscreen at a home game for the first time in 25-sum-odd years.’ The Minnesota athletic department hopes that the team will also benefit from moving the stadium back to campus. There has already been much talk about how the new facilities will improve recruiting, as well as give the team a newfound home-field advantage. The facts speak for themselves – there was never much of an advantage in the Metrodome. The Golden Gophers never once produced a Big Ten Championship team, a single big win, or even a victory over rival Michigan in the ‘Little Brown Jug Game’ once at home during that time span, Murphy said. ‘All of our big wins came on the road while we played at the Metrodome,’ Murphy said. ‘We never beat Michigan or Ohio State in the Dome, but we did beat them on the road. Maybe that says something.’ Taking into account early feedback from players and fans, it seems as if the move back to an outdoor stadium will work for the Golden Gopher program. The team opens its season Saturday at Syracuse (noon, ESPN2) – a team that knows a thing or two about playing in an aging domed stadium. The Orange do, after all, share a bevy of similarities with Minnesota, as both played in outdoor stadiums that once resided on the same spots as their current stadiums (Minnesota’s new field is at the site of the old Memorial Stadium, the Carrier Dome at the site of Archbold Stadium). Syracuse also won its lone national championship only a year prior to the Golden Gophers last national title in 1960. But the two teams differ in one way, as many of the Orange faithful are content indoors. ‘I hope we wouldn’t (leave), I love the Dome,’ said former Syracuse player (1989-2005) and current SU linebacker coach Dan Conley. We don’t need a 100,000-seat stadium. If you put 50,000 people in there, it sounds like 100,000. I love the place, I hope they keep it as it is.’ The irony of it all is that after all of the work to move the Golden Gophers back outside, the team and its fans will have to withstand one more game beneath a Teflon roof. One more game in air conditioning. One more game inside another nearly thirty-year-old battle-scarred bubble – The Carrier Dome.

‘(It’s) very funny, I don’t think we will have many fans at Syracuse simply because they can’t stomach another game in a dome,’ Murphy said. For the past 27 years the only reminder of outdoor football for Minnesota fans resided outside a small museum within the McNamara Alumni Center. The glimpse into the past was a ten-foot tall beautiful brick arch entranceway to the old Memorial Stadium. A preserved arch gate that once actually brought Gopher fans outdoor football. Once Saturday’s game is over, however, and Minnesota fans exit the signature revolving doors of another Dome, they’ll be able to completely turn their attention to outdoor football once again. TCF Bank Stadium’s official opening day will be less than a week away, and Murphy and other fans will no longer relegate to the arch inside the Alumni Center for the only visions of outdoor Gopher football. After 28 years they will finally have their home. ‘When they were in the dome, fans looked at the arch and it was almost a sad thing,’ Murphy said. ‘We were like ‘how did that get away, we should be walking through that,’ now it’s positive, it doesn’t represent a sense of loss any longer.’

aolivero@syr.edu