On Friday, October 16, 1998, the Lincoln Tigers celebrated the grand opening of its home field bleacher, playing against the traditional rival, the Wilson Mules. The hillside location of the bleachers has been remodeled with aluminum benches, and an extra-wide first level to accomodate wheel chair access, along with ramps and some handicapped parking spaces.
The Bleachers were condemned as unsafe for the past 10 years, and this new construction is allowing an entirely new generation to be able to see the home team on its home field with a complete view of the field. The Ribbon-Cutting Ceremony was held at 2:30 p.m. just before the beginning of the game, with Ms. Enriquez, Assistant Principal representing the School Administration, and Vera Padilla, Coordinator and Career Advisor, representing the Alumni Association, along with several members of the alumni.
The home games location provides ample seating, and food and beverage stands with an assortment of menu items, including hot dogs and hamburgers donated by Dino's Burgers located at Griffin and Main. Another feature of the remodeling project is that the access to the stands is improved by the extra wide asphalt entry corridor on the field level to reach the aisle stairs landings. In this project, the original concrete stairs and landings were used, with the new benches lined up for an exact match to the old locations. Older alumni will be able to remember the heavy shrubbery and trees in the upper left side of the bleacher that gave a heavy supply of shade in the afternoon hours. This is gone now. There are some trees and small shrubs, but time and circumstances have made some changes to the landscaping. The last few upper rows were eliminated to create a retaining wall and expanded area.
The football scoreboard by the Gym was refurbished and worked nicely for a check on the score and time. The possession indicators were something that needed some getting used to, it seems, as often in the first quarter, both teams or the wrong teams was marked with the possession of the ball. That should be improved as everyone gets used to the facility.
Providing the play-by-play commentary was Mr. Shapiro, who many know as the Tigers regular game announcer. He was in very good style, and provided a generous level of morale-boosting commentary during the pre-game time.
The Tiger's Band, with its black-themed uniforms, were in good form and gave a musical boost during various moments in the game and at halftime. The Tigers Cheerleaders and Drill Team, is entirely different from what this writer remembers in the 60's. There are about 20 Cheerleaders, in contrast to the 4 or 5 we had, and maybe 30 in the drill team, which is down from the group that I remember to be about 100 in the drill team of the 60's.
The game got off to an abrupt start by a sudden start by combiined Wilson and Lincoln Bands playing of the National Anthem, catching many of the fans by surprise, and causing a hasty rise in response. This was one of the many small but noticeable glitches in the proceedings, but, coordination of announcements on the public address system and other routines will be improved with more experience at home.
The attendance at the game gradually picked up during the first quarter of play, and a nice crowd, filling about 1/2 of the stands saw the game. The Tiger varsity, coming home to play for the first time this year, had problems picking up yardage, and the Mules were able to score on turnovers by the Tigers. The end of the first Quarter score was 28-0, for Wilson. The final score was 38-0, which was not entirely a sign of doom for the Tigers, since there were no points scored against the Tigers in the entire second half of play, as the defense settled down to keep the visitors controlled.
The Wilson band and visiting fans were left on the far side of the field with the old portable bleachers set up on the track for their use. This is another difference from the setup of the '60's, which is all I can refer to, where the visitors sat in ths shorter section of the hillside bleachers. Until the attendance by the Tigers calls for more space, I think the visitor should be able to use the same bleachers. One disappointment was that the stand were not packed with fans for the first day. There should have been as many students there as the stands could contain for this date. I think that the fact that there is a full price charge for tickets, together with a large portion of student apathy as it relates to the football program, resulted in this. We only hope that the Homecoming Game on the 30th will get more to the game, and, if some foresight is applied to this matter, the ticket prices for students will come down, at least for this First Season, so students will be able to experience this aspect of attending high school.
All the rest of the season's games for the varsity will be at home, and the freshman/sophmore teams, formerly referred to as the JV's, will usually be on the day before the Varsity game.
See a game, and see some old friends. Show support of the alma mater, and see the new facility for yourself.
by: rguevara.