Gaylord Family Oklahoma Memorial Stadium - Lights, Camera, Football, Money

Lights, Camera, Football, Money

Up until the 1980s, the NCAA had a tight grip on television contracts for Division I-A college football games. Compared to the current plethora of college football games on television, only two (on rare occasions, three) college football games were televised each week and the schedule of games was set in stone well in advance of the season opening. The NCAA reasoned that televised games cut into attendance, and more TV games would cost more money in lost gate receipts than could be gained with television contracts.

In the fall of 1981, the University of Oklahoma joined with the University of Georgia to sue the NCAA in Federal court in Oklahoma City. In this class-action lawsuit on behalf of members of the College Football Association, the two schools alleged that the NCAA's contracts with ABC, NBC, and CBS violated the Sherman Antitrust Act by preventing each college and conference from selling its product on the open market. The court agreed with the schools in 1982 and voided the NCAA's television contracts. Less than two years later, the Sooners and the rest of Division I-A were playing seven to ten games each season on television. This presented a new problem for the University and its stadium.

At the time, the thriving Sooners and the Chicago Cubs had one thing in common: neither Wrigley Field nor Owen Field had permanent artificial lighting sufficient for television broadcasts at night. This meant that untelevised home games had to start in the morning or early afternoon so as to be completed by dark, because the cost of leasing a set of portable television lights was too high for a game that would not earn enough revenue to pay for those lights. For all televised games, portable lights on trucks were rented – but the leasing costs cut into the University's revenue, and often the four or five portable light trucks stayed on campus for weeks in anticipation of the next televised game. True night games were very difficult to play in Norman because of the amount of portable lighting needed to illuminate the field adequately for spectators to see the players, much less the light required for television. Prior to 1982, the University knew which games would be televised and could plan months ahead for leasing the necessary lighting.

With the successful outcome of the court case against the NCAA, more late afternoon and night games were scheduled in Norman and television schedules changed during the season, requiring large portable light trucks to take up space on campus while waiting for the next televised game. It was not until 1997 that permanent television lights were installed in all four corners of the stadium, along with a new south end zone video scoreboard to replace the antiquated main scoreboard.

Owen Field switched back to natural grass (prescription turf) from the aging Superturf in 1994, improving the field's drainage system in the process. (Prior to the drainage improvements it was not uncommon for water to make large pools on the sidelines during heavy rains). These two improvements, the turf switch in 1994 and the lighting/scoreboard installation in 1997, were the only major improvements to the stadium for nearly 20 years.