2 minutes ago, gbballfan21 said:

 

WKU should never host the finals again!!

They put teams in batting cages with no running water as a locker room!! Absolute joke to be rewarded for a trip to a state finals and to be put in a batting cage with a 10 minute walk to the field as your reward. UK should be the host for as long as they can accommodate it. I can promise you, once on the field, the kids could care less how empty the stadium may look, it’s all about the experience!

Lexington is so much more convenient for the majority of the state than Bowling Green.

I was speaking about the venue as a fan but I can't argue with anything else you said. 

9 hours ago, Colonels_Wear_Blue said:

I could be wrong, but I'm pretty sure Kroger Field & Cardinal Stadium still both have traditional lights, although they both have LED video screens, and I know at least Kroger Field has a lighted LED video/multimedia band that runs around the perimeter of the second tier of seats. Cov Cath's football stadium was the first stadium in the state of Kentucky (on any level) to have LED lights, and those didn't premier until August of 2017.

To your point, though, half of the state finals football games are played in daylight.  Still, I mean, I guess you can still have a LED light show while the sun is shining, but I don't know what the purpose really is. ??

I’m not even saying you need the light show but they could easily add some stuff. Like instead of announcing one starter at a time why not do it like uk football or pro baseball teams do during warmups they introduce the starters on the jumbotron with a picture of them in uniform. Like I said earlier rent a couple of smoke machines and turn them on as teams run out of the tunnel. Easy cheap things they could add.

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3 hours ago, gbballfan21 said:

 

WKU should never host the finals again!!

They put teams in batting cages with no running water as a locker room!! Absolute joke to be rewarded for a trip to a state finals and to be put in a batting cage with a 10 minute walk to the field as your reward. UK should be the host for as long as they can accommodate it. I can promise you, once on the field, the kids could care less how empty the stadium may look, it’s all about the experience!

Lexington is so much more convenient for the majority of the state than Bowling Green.

Having had a team in the finals at both WKU and UK in the finals I have experienced what you are pointing out. We were in the 'batting cage' at WKU but it wasn't a 10 minute walk. Maybe 4 or 5 if you took your time. But we might have been in a closer building. I agree it was inconvenient to some extent.  I also had a team in the state finals at Papa John's and that set up was terrible. It was the worse of the three by far. Maybe the other team had a better locker room than we did.  We had to put our team in two separate small locker rooms and had to meet as a team in a narrow hallway. It was like being in a long closet.  UK by far was the best in terms of room etc. It was great to play at Kroger but I just liked the feel of that smaller venue WKU had. 

26 minutes ago, Coach Preston said:

 

Having had a team in the finals at both WKU and UK in the finals I have experienced what you are pointing out. We were in the 'batting cage' at WKU but it wasn't a 10 minute walk. Maybe 4 or 5 if you took your time. But we might have been in a closer building. I agree it was inconvenient to some extent.  I also had a team in the state finals at Papa John's and that set up was terrible. It was the worse of the three by far. Maybe the other team had a better locker room than we did.  We had to put our team in two separate small locker rooms and had to meet as a team in a narrow hallway. It was like being in a long closet.  UK by far was the best in terms of room etc. It was great to play at Kroger but I just liked the feel of that smaller venue WKU had. 

I think part of the problem is football stadiums just aren’t designed to host multiple teams in single days like arenas are. Some are better than others but you’ll always have those issues at even the nicest football stadiums (unless it’s a multi purpose dome like Lucas Oil Stadium in Indianapolis).

Again, I get the atmosphere for basketball, being the premier event, being better. My issue is with other sports getting celebrations and recognition shut down in the name of COVID, and the same standard not being applied to basketball.

10 minutes ago, rjs4470 said:

Again, I get the atmosphere for basketball, being the premier event, being better. My issue is with other sports getting celebrations and recognition shut down in the name of COVID, and the same standard not being applied to basketball.

Let's hope the fall 2021 football season is completely back to normal. 

33 minutes ago, theguru said:

Let's hope the fall 2021 football season is completely back to normal. 

Texas Rangers had 40,000 at stadium today so that bodes well for normal season by fall.

The class A game starts at what, 11AM or Noon on a Friday?   It's hard to be overly dramatic in daylight on a Friday morning when there's a 50% chance the weather is gonna stink.

17 hours ago, gbballfan21 said:

UK should be the host for as long as they can accommodate it. 

Lexington is so much more convenient for the majority of the state than Bowling Green.

Let's just tell it like it is... People want the finals at UK because it's UK, not because of convenience. The location is never going to be perfect for all 12 teams regardless of where it is so that shouldn't really factor that much. 

The state finals were just as good when they were in Louisville as they are in Lexington. 

1 hour ago, TheDeuce said:

Let's just tell it like it is... People want the finals at UK because it's UK, not because of convenience. The location is never going to be perfect for all 12 teams regardless of where it is so that shouldn't really factor that much. 

The state finals were just as good when they were in Louisville as they are in Lexington. 

I don't see a big difference between Lexington and Louisville as far as stadiums go. I attended state finals at Old Cardinal, played in one at Old Cardinal, attended at Papa John, and attended at Kroger Field. Personally speaking, I felt closer to the field when I was in the stands at Kroger Field than I did at Papa John.

As far as location goes, seeing as they have to have the stadium contracted long before you have any idea who will be playing in the finals, I feel like the KHSAA's decision is best made based around population. I'm not exactly sure how that plays out in terms of the state though.

Looking at the populations of the 20 most populous counties in the state: 

University of Kentucky: 46.37% (1205K) have the shortest drive-time to this stadium.
University of Louisville: 39.47% (1027K) have the shortest drive-time to this stadium.
Western Kentucky University: 14.16% (370K) have the shortest drive-time to this stadium.

If you remove WKU from contention, then it puts UofL ahead of UK with 53.63% to 46.37%.

38 minutes ago, Colonels_Wear_Blue said:

I don't see a big difference between Lexington and Louisville as far as stadiums go. I attended state finals at Old Cardinal, played in one at Old Cardinal, attended at Papa John, and attended at Kroger Field. Personally speaking, I felt closer to the field when I was in the stands at Kroger Field than I did at Papa John.

Right. A "big" college stadium is a big college stadium regardless of where it is. As was mentioned before, the players don't care what stadium they are in once the game starts. 

The fog machine brought back a great memory. Officiating a third round playoff game. Home team used the fogger at goalpost. Really thick, and for some reason the cloud enshrouded the field. Could not start game, and as I went to tell visiting coach, he was quite irritated by the decision.....until I took a ball, tossed it way up in the air and we had trouble seeing it! We had a great laugh and a great game!

The answer to the question can be found in the KHSAA general ledger for the 2018-2019 school year. 

$1.2 million in tickets sold to boys basketball

$370,000 in tickets sold to football.

 

What if the KHSAA delegated player picture/bios for the starters (or all players) to the schools in a standardized format that the KHSAA could run throughout the game on the jumbotron?  Off the top of my head and thinking of Highlands, I am sure the Highlands Broadcasting Network would jump at an opportunity like that and would do a great job.

Additionally, the weather can't be overlooked.  The football finals are normally long, cold days and I believe any unnecessary down time is a negative.