By Jett Johnson
Sports Editor
Trevecca’s
expects a new athletic facility in the near future.
Dan Boone, president of Trevecca, discussed the cost of the athletic facility.
“We’re talking about 35 million for the entire project. Something like 20 million for the new gymnasium or competition center, the arena kind of building, and then another seven or eight for the addition to the back of the gym. Then, an additional 7 or 8 million for what they call ‘site prep work’ or ‘architectural work’ equipment,” said Boone.
Boone also explains how the process of getting the money will go.
“We would really like to do it all at once because it’s less expensive to build. But we won’t be borrowing any money on this. And we have less than 1 million raised already. So we’ve got to raise $34 million before we can start the process. We’re going to ask for donations,” said Boone.
The time frame of when the project will be completed does not seem clear at this point to Boone.
“Because the facility is totally dependent on raising the money, we have no time frame and can’t control the time frame. It’ll be totally dependent on receiving the money,” said Boone.
Mark Elliot, head athletic director, says practice space is a key reason for this new facility.
“If you were to ask what is the biggest
need in the athletic department, I’d say practice space. We now have eight teams that need a gym floor. JV has gotten the short end of the stick when it comes to scheduling practices, so that’s a reason why we need an additional facility for gym practice space,” said Elliot.
Although the facility will add a lot more scale to the athletic department, there will not be much staff change.
“We can build a twenty million dollar building like it’s a car. You buy the car but then do you buy gas, oil and maintain that? Someone has to buy the lights for a new building and clean up events there. When it comes to staff, the only staff that would be added would be if there’s a coach of a new team that we’ve started as a result of the additional space,” said Elliot.
According to Elliot, there would be a great change in culture to athletics at Trevecca from this facility being built.
“Every athletic department in my opinion has to have an iconic building or facility. If you’re a Memphis Grizzly fan, what’s the iconic facility? It’s Fedex Forum. If you’re a Vanderbilt fan, it’s Memorial Gym. It doesn’t matter where it is, you have to have an iconic facility that says this is home. It’s the pride point of the Trojan nation,” said Elliot.
This facility is also expected to have multiple purposes, according to Elliot.
“We want something that has multiple uses and is multidimensional that can say this is new and us. We need to be able to push the seats back and have graduation in this building so we can seat almost three thousand people. We can do that in this facility so it will be used for more than just a basketball or volleyball game,” said Elliot.
Elliot thinks this facility will mean a lot to the sports department as a whole.
“There’s support for the athletic department, and there’s an understanding that the athletic department is a vital part of the university. It’s good for the university to have athletics and to see the university invest in a facility just shows their support,” said Elliot.
Quotes from Dan Boone were provided by Alayna Simons.
