FIELD OF THE YEAR COLLEGE AND UNIVERSITY FOOTBALL
CHRISTOPHER NEWPORT UNIVERSITY
The Field of the Year Awards program is made possible by the support of sponsors Carolina Green, World Class Athletic Surfaces and EPS.
DIVISION III FOOTBALL IS ONE OF the purest sports to watch. There is no NIL money, television agreements, or huge stadiums— just student athletes paying for an education while also playing the sport they love. At Christopher Newport University we pride ourselves on the DIII student athlete experience, and Kelchner Field is no exception. Over the last season we have faced budget cuts, a compressed schedule, and unpredictable weather. However, we still managed to take a 20-plus-year-old field with no drainage through some challenging conditions, and put forth a field that rivals our Division I peers. In an evolving college financial climate we were tasked with figuring out how to do it with less, while still meeting and exceeding the needs and expectations of our football program. At the same time, we are tasked with providing a safe playing surface to our local USL2 club, Lionsbridge FC, during our entire summer offseason. In DIII we do not have lights on our practice fields so our football program must use the game field. When spring practice wraps up, we are usually left with two to three weeks before Lionsbridge FC takes over the field for the summer. By the time we finish hosting USL2 playoffs we could be left with as little as two weeks before our football program begins camp. This requires us to be aggressive with our cultural practices during very small scheduling windows without jeopardizing player safety for our USL2 partners. We fine-tuned and pushed our agronomic practices to answer the call of meeting our needs with a reduced budget. We reduced our nitrogen input by a pound per thousand square feet. We purchased an Imants Recycle Dresser to allow us to cut back on sand purchases while still maintaining consistency when topdressing. Kelchner Field has a heavy organic layer in the top of its profile, has not been re-graded in 24 years, and does not have any subsurface drainage. Knowing that we would have less clean sand going into the profile, we were more aggressive with our aeration. This year was also unique in that we played seven football or soccer games with rain leading up to and / or during the game in amounts between 0.55 to 3.85 inches. Our hard work and planning paid off as we were still able to consistently provide a safe playing surface. Our team at CNU does not have the budget, resume or facilities of a lot of our college peers. Our athletes pay to play the game they are so passionate about. We take enormous pride in merging their passion with our own and mixing in some hard work, dedication and a little creativity to give them what we hope is the best field they play on all year.
– Christopher Webb, CSFM, associate director of grounds
Level and category of submission: College and University Football
Field manager: Christopher Webb, CSFM
Title: Associate director of grounds
Education: Bachelor’ s degree, Crop and Soil Environmental Science; Horticulture
Original facility construction: 2001
Turfgrass: Originally Tifway 419 bermuda. TifTuf bermuda was introduced between the hashes and into the sideline in 2016, and has since taken over 95 % of the field.
Overseed: We start by deep tine aerating solid tines in the sidelines and between the hashes. We solid tine aerate the entire field with 1 / 2 " solid tines on a 2 " x2 " spacing. We broadcast our perennial ryegrass blend( Trifecta by Lebanon) three directions on the field for an initial seeding rate of ~ 350 pounds per acre. We come back after every home game with pre-germinated seed and re-seed accordingly based off of field conditions but at a minimum of 150-200 pounds of additional seed broadcast through the higher use areas.
Rootzone: 90 % sand, 7 % silt, 3 % clay
SportsField Management( SFM): Congratulations on the Field of the Year win. What are you most proud of with this win? Christopher Webb, CSFM: I am proud of how our athletic team and our entire grounds department worked together throughout the year to consistently give our athletics community a solid surface to play on. It really is a team effort; at one point we even had our irrigation technician out there helping us knock out a game painting when time was tight.
SFM: What were the biggest challenges you have faced with the winning field, and how have you approached those challenges? Webb: Our biggest challenge on Kelchner Field is finding time for our cultural practices and recovery. With no lights on our practice fields, our football program uses Kelchner Field for their morning spring practices. We get about two to three weeks in late April when they wrap up before our local USL2 team, Lionsbridge FC, begins using the field for the summer season. Lionsbridge FC wraps up about two weeks before our football team returns to begin their fall season. It is a race transitioning from one season to the other, much less from the ryegrass to growing back the bermuda. It is a real challenge to find time to fit in maintenance and compete with all of that use and wear throughout the year. I think we have done a great job at communicating and advocating for time to squeeze in those cultural practices and letting the organizations see the effect they have on the surface. That communication builds a strong trust within our community, which allows mutual respect and understanding when we advocate for balancing the field’ s needs against the schedule.
SFM: Can you share a little about your overall management approach to the winning field and what you feel have been the most important aspects to getting this field to an award-winning level? Webb: I think our team would tell you that I am never satisfied, and they are probably correct. I would argue that we do not share the luxuries that a lot of our peers in Division I have. There is no sod on plastic to repair wear areas or winterkill. We cannot host a concert and get a field rebuild out of it. We have to be on our“ A” game every day, and focus on all of the little things from agronomics to divots the entire year. Everyone sees the finished product on game day but few get to see our team filling divots after games, covering the heavy wear areas through cold snaps, or moving plugs that they drop in our wear areas to keep us going when we have to transition to soccer. Our management of Kelchner Field truly is a team effort.
SFM: You have won SFMA FOY awards in the past in both the softball and soccer categories. Now you have won in the College and University Football category. What is different about this win, and what does it say about your program that you are able to produce award-winning surfaces across multiple sports? Webb: One of the things that stands out to me is that the full-time staff that were with us for the other two awards are not with us anymore. It speaks to the standard, support and the high level of execution that we have within the university to achieve that level of success across an evolving workforce. In a college football landscape rife with artificial turf, CNU takes an immense amount of pride— and considers it a home field advantage— that we prioritize our players’ safety by providing them with a natural grass surface to win championships on.
SFM: Please tell us about your crew, and anything else you would like us to know about your organization and the fields / facilities that you manage? Webb: Our team has endured a wild journey through the last few years. We’ ve battled turnover and budget reductions to ensure that we play our part in the university’ s long-term success. I would be remiss not to mention our campus grounds team members who assist us with items from irrigation to holding the boards when painting before game days. Our coaches also have their players help with filling divots. While we may be a small regional university, a stark difference between us and our DI peers is the level of community and camaraderie that we share at CNU. I will put it like this; when was the last time you saw an athletic director from a DI school hauling conditioner in the back of their personal SUV to keep the crew stocked while battling through both baseball and softball regionals in the rain?
SFM: Can you share a bit of insight into what the Field of the Year application process was like for you, as well as any tips you might have for other sports field managers? Webb: I think it is less about the FOY process and more about good note taking and documenting throughout the year. It is important to be able to look back at photos and notes from previous years to compare how we are progressing, and find opportunities to grow. I think that the foundation of record keeping makes the application process so much smoother.