Stallions home for good: Sierra high school to debut $3 million renovated field to bring football games back to community
Sierra High School Assistant Principal and Athletic Director Bob Bentley calls the red, yellow and black stallion painted on the school’s new turf field his baby.
Originally, the school wanted to just put an “S” in the middle of the field, citing cost cutting measures. Once Bentley found out it cost the same to put the mascot on the field, it was a no-brainer.
The new field that can reliably host a season’s worth of Stallions home varsity football games is a big deal for Bentley, an alumnus who graduated in 2003. And it’s a big deal for Sierra and the surrounding community. Renovations began just after boys’ soccer season ended in October, Bentley said. The new field features stadium lights, a track surrounding the field, 1,000-seat bleachers, a new scoreboard, a concession stand with restrooms and a press box.
“That’s the trademark. We put our stamp on to this to say this is our home field now. Not having to go to a district stadium, go to a whole different high school to be able to play games, (the stallion) right there is saying, ‘This is Sierra’s’,” Bentley said.
Part of a $3-million project which also brought a new softball field and tennis courts last year, the new field will be used for boys’ and girls soccer, track and field and, of course, Friday night football lights. The funds come from a $180-million bond passed in 2018 by voters for improvements in Harrison School District 2.
Christine O’Brien, public information officer for the district, said Sierra’s field renovation came near the end of the list of improvements to be made across 20 schools, some of which had more pressing concerns. Nevertheless, home games at Sierra have been something the district and the community have been eyeing for a long time. O’Brien said Sierra closed the 2022-2023 school year with 909 student to the 1,106 students at Harrison, the district’s other high school.
While soccer has always been played at Sierra, the Stallions football team has spent most of its history playing home games at Harrison. A home field was missing. That, Harrison students had, and the district wanted to provide it, O’Brien said.
But the upcoming season will not be the first time Sierra has hosted home games at its field.
In 2019, the school broke tradition and played a full season at Sierra under the tenure of coach Draye Ersery. The decision came about from discussions between the district athletic director and Sierra’s principal, Bentley said. The rollout wasn’t perfect, but the community responded in a big way.
“Even when we did the year here, just the amount of the student body that came out was huge,” Bentley said. “When we play over at Harrison you don’t see a lot of our student body travel across the district to that side, because of the means to travel a lot of times.”
But despite the best efforts of the school, the hiccups weren’t something current coach Joe Roskam could ignore. Following the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, Roskam made the decision in 2021 to move home games back to Harrison.
“Where the clock operator was, they actually had to look through the crowd to see the officials. So what I didn’t want to do, I didn’t want to lose a game because of officials not being able to see the clock operator,” Roskam said. “For you to be able to film and (to) coach you had to build a scaffolding. It was a safety hazard for your coaches to be up there. That’s not what a classy program does.”
Going back to Harrison for the safety and dignity of the program was an easy decision for Roskam even though true home games at Sierra has been something he’s wanted for a long time, dating back to his first tenure as Sierra’s football coach in the early 2000s.
On August 25, Roskam, Bentley and countless other members of the community get to live that dream as Sierra welcomes Littleton for the season opener. It will be a soft opening of the facilities with some minor changes still needed, Bentley said. But come Sept. 22 for Sierra’s homecoming contest against Mitchell, Bentley expects the field to be fully operational.
No makeshift scaffolding, no compromises, all class. Coach Roskam would have it no other way.
“I think everybody at Sierra has always wanted to play right there in the community,” he said. “It just doesn’t feel like a home game when you gotta get on a bus and drive 10 minutes to go to a home game. It doesn’t feel right.”
“I would rather lose doing it the right way than win and be lucky or be dirty. … I don’t ever want (my players) to feel like they’re second-class citizens. I want them to feel like they’re important, that they are loved, that they’re cared about and that their school cares about them, their district cares about them and they want what’s best for them.”
A new scoreboard and goalposts are among the updated features of the new Sierra High School stadium. They are a small part of a $3 million project which brought a new softball field, tennis courts, track and turf field.
Sierra High Assistant Principal and Athletics Director Bob Bentley, who is also a Sierra alumnus, remembers when the school’s field didn’t even have hash marks.