Platteville, Wisconsin is nestled in the very southwest corner of the state, a community of about 12 thousand but when the college kids come to the University of Wisconsin-Platteville, it goes up in amount. The university hosts about 10 thousand students and amidst the campus lies Ralph E. Davis Pioneer Stadium. It's a 10 thousand seat stadium, though all bleachers. It has some neat features but what do you expect coming into the stadium?
Coming into the stadium, you have a walk possibly past the other athletic fields but you notice the first thing is that Pioneer Stadium is sunk in a hill, which gives it a bowl type feeling but with a cool couple of hills in one end zone while the other is pretty open ended with a net protecting the scoreboard. Upon entering there is a cool tailgate area to the right side behind the main grandstand and then the ticket booths. However they don't really label which is students and other is just general public so that can be confusing. So what is to expect when you go through the gates?
Well it's very basic, and that probably explains the price. The tickets and concessions are cheap anywhere from 2 to 4 dollars, but that's because they are all brought in from elsewhere. Ice cream from Blue Bunny, Pizza from Pizza Hut, burgers from A&W. I do understand it is a school that more likely doesn't have the means to make it's own food and has to rely on elsewhere, but it just shows how basic it is for lack of better words. However the major negative is no merchandise tent or stand. They have something that would look like it but it wasn't open. For a place that had it's homecoming that weekend, you would want to capitalize on this. On top of that, I don't know where there would be merchandise because despite being a UW-Whitewater alum, I really wanted a Platteville hat. Albeit that didn't happen. So with that, what did the atmosphere offer?
The stadium from the outside like I said is kind of a sunken bowl feeling and that this works to create a cool atmosphere for the stadium in general. The stadium has bleacher seating which is kind of the norm for Division 3 stadiums and most college stadiums in general. The field honestly looks nice and there is plenty of room to walk around behind the end zone with the hill. Overall they did well with that. There are no major frills with the stadium and has ample room to walk around. The field itself is good and the scoreboard is good as well. The stadium PA announcer is quite good and keeps the crowd involved in the game. He also provides updates around the WIAC and on the Big Ten, since Platteville is about an hour west of Madison and a lot of the crowd are Badgers fans as well. The crowd itself is pretty lively for most of the game and will stay in it barring a blowout (of which this game was.) That is also really just par for the course for D3 Football. With that, I headed out with an impression of this stadium is just average at best overall. The only thing they beat UW-Whitewater on is more choices of food concessions but the rest UWW beats them on, including game day atmosphere. That's how I see Pioneer Stadium in my eyes, and just the average football fan will probably just go to see D3 football and that is it.
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