Brooks: Champions Center Tour Creates New Believer

BOULDER – Early last May I was among those sitting in the Dal Ward Varsity Room and, with some eyes (mine) occasionally rolling, listening as grand, lavish plans were detailed for a new multi-million dollar athletic complex.

The day was typically spring in Colorado – unsettled, a heavy hint of rain, and mid-30 degree temps. After some deliberation, Athletic Director Rick George elected to conduct the speaking portion of the ground-breaking ceremony indoors. And upon his arrival at Dal Ward, CU President Bruce Benson – a witness to ground being broken for more than a few university facilities – asked of George, “Where's the pile of dirt?”

The best George could offer in the way of an official outdoor ground-breaking was ushering those in attendance downstairs to the northeast corner of Folsom Field, where they saw a piece of heavy equipment's bucket delicately dislodge a slab of concrete in the first row of the stadium's northeast stands.

There was no pile of dirt on May 12, but plenty of piles – and a lot more – were coming. And fast.

Over the next few weeks, athletic department employees ventured to the Herbst Academic Center's windows that overlooked Folsom's north end zone, “oohing and ahhing” at the speed with which the bleacher seats disappeared and the total transformation of the entire northeast corner began.

Two weeks after the ceremonial ground-breaking, I was interviewing former AD Bill Marolt in a deserted Varsity Room and occasionally having a hard time hearing him above the rumble of heavy equipment a couple of stories below. The Dal Ward Athletics Center was constructed six years into Marolt's watch at CU (1984-96), and Marolt commented that, yes, a facelift in the athletic department/football program indeed was a long time coming.

True, but once it started, the progress has been startling. Almost unbelievable, really, when you consider that in mid-February 2014 there was no paperwork for the project. And from May 12 until Monday, when a Champions Center “topping out” luncheon and ceremony were held, the progress has been jaw-dropping – at least for a guy who occasionally rolled his eyes last May. On Monday, one of two ceremonial signed iron beams was hoisted into place, topping out the Champions Center.

The warp-speed work has been done by 425 people a day, employed by 98 different sub-contractors. As of Monday, the total man hours of work had topped 401,000, and the total quoted last spring was a million until the project was completed. My guess is that total will go up.

ALONG WITH A HANDFUL OF other athletic sports media relation types, I toured the Champions Center from bottom to top last week. George, who introduced himself to a field house (Balch) brimming with hard hats as “the guy with the shiny shoes who walks around out there a lot,” conducted the tour.

No sucking up to the boss intended, but as we toured the massive (375,000 square foot) building last week George's pride in the Mortensen/Populous project was as hard to conceal as it is justified. The initial quoted cost of the project ($143 million) has crept up and the initial completion timeline (late August 2015) has been pushed back. Funds are still being sought and the indoor practice facility (with a parking garage below and an outdoor grass field adjacent) won't be done until January 2016.

But the Champions Center, replete with locker rooms and weight rooms for football and other amenities described/shown elsewhere on CUBuffs.com, will be up, running and ready for occupancy before Mike MacIntyre's 2015 team reports in August.

I don't find college football's facilities “arms race” particularly appealing, but I do find it unquestionably necessary – if a school is “all in.” CU was lagging when it left the Big 12 four years ago and noticeably behind when it entered the Pac-12.

MacIntyre, of course, noticed when he was hired three winters ago and collaborated with George, Benson and Chancellor Phil DiStefano about catching up. MacIntyre also has noticed that when the project is complete the Buffs will be up to speed (and maybe a mile or two ahead) in the Pac-12.

He told reporters on Monday that in the very long time CU has done without, the Buffs enjoyed the unintended benefit of scrutinizing athletic/football complexes at other schools and skimming off the best of the best ideas. MacIntyre said he was “pretty familiar” with all the Pac-12 schools and the Buffs' finished product “will be the best in the league.” (Think that might trigger another avalanche of Nike money at Oregon?)

“We spent a lot of money to build something this great, but we were the last one to build one,” MacIntyre said. “So we went around and stole all the good ideas and put it in there . . . it is extremely exciting. Every day I drive by and see something else change. It's phenomenal for our future."

MACINTYRE'S GOAL IS TO UTILIZE the new facilities for a long, long time. This shouldn't be a news flash, but there is no doubt that the project raises the bar – and quickly – for him and his staff. Benson, DiStefano, George, et al, didn't sign off on something so spectacular to be a Pac-12 also-ran.

MacIntyre knows that, and his program appears to be pulling free of that status. This season and next have all the earmarks of the same sort of turnaround he directed at San Jose State, where his first two teams were 1-12 and 5-7, respectively, and his third was 10-2. His two-season CU record is 6-18 overall, 1-17 Pac-12, but the prediction here is that we've seen the last of those lowly numbers.

The new football complex and indoor practice facility, coupled with more W's and CU's already established academic offerings, will be huge for MacIntyre's recruiting. After pitching promises about facilities to his first two classes, he'll be able to offer knock-your-socks-off tours to the prospective Class of 2016.

On the George-guided tour we took last week, he described how recruits would exit an elevator in the football offices and proceed down a hallway that opens toward a full view of Folsom's west side and the Flatirons backdrop. MacIntyre's and his assistants' offices offer the same eye-popping view, plus balconies that will take a recruit a step closer.

Couple that with the Champions Center's state-of-the-art sports medicine and performance centers, its recognition of and tribute to past Buffs greats, as well as other features that will make the building a community showpiece, and pitching CU to prospects should become more successful than not.

Monday's topping out ceremonies, said George, signaled “a momentous day” for CU athletics. The project “is the enabler for us to complete our short-term mission and long-term vision.”

Call me crusty, call me a cynic, but in the Varsity Room not quite a year ago my vision certainly didn't come close to matching his. Over the past week there's been a dramatic correction. I've seen the future and I've been amazed.

Contact: BG.Brooks@Colorado.EDU