What was up with PSU's turf?

[Obliviax]

The field looked bad on TV. There were a lot of brown spots and very thin in areas where you wouldn't expect. By that I mean that fields get messed up from play between the 25 and 45 yard lines. I noticed brown areas in the end zones and around the ten.

I've come to expect PSU's field to be vibrant green and the best in the nation. The field seemed to be good from a player's perspective but was not as green as my yard!

 

[PSU2UNC]

Agree that it didn't look great, but I think it's a combination of:

Four weeks of home games in a row (your lawn likely doesn't have 300 lb men running around on it)
Spending time under a tarp (lots of rain in last four weeks)
it gets progressively harder to re-grow grass in colder climates as the season progresses
It's also possible that having other events (concerts) has resulted in soil compaction which may affect quality of turf

Mostly the first two, I think. But our grounds crew is the best in the business.

 

[ram2020]

I have a friend, Penn State grad, that is the greenskeeper at a high end country club down the road. He was aghast with how the field looked. He graduated from PSUs program for greenskeepers.

 

[The Spin Meister]

Grubs?

 

[Obliviax]

Agree that it didn't look great, but I think it's a combination of:

Four weeks of home games in a row (your lawn likely doesn't have 300 lb men running around on it)
Spending time under a tarp (lots of rain in last four weeks)
it gets progressively harder to re-grow grass in colder climates as the season progresses
It's also possible that having other events (concerts) has resulted in soil compaction which may affect quality of turf

Mostly the first two, I think. But our grounds crew is the best in the business.

I would normally agree but the bad areas didn't reflect a usual football field beat up by "300 lb linemen". When that is the case, the field looks bad in the most common playing areas like the 25 to 40 yard lines. For UCLA the fields were even bad in the end zones.

 

[LMTLION]

Much of PA has been pretty dry since the summer. It is embarrassing that they haven’t maintained it appropriately.

 

[Kasparaitis]

Much of PA has been pretty dry since the summer. It is embarrassing that they haven’t maintained it appropriately.

Yeah that’s either a maintenance problem or alternate use issue (concerts, etc.). Playing football once a week did not cause that.

 

[step.eng69]

I would normally agree but the bad areas didn't reflect a usual football field beat up by "300 lb linemen". When that is the case, the field looks bad in the most common playing areas like the 25 to 40 yard lines. For UCLA the fields were even bad in the end zones.

I mentioned the same during the gamed thread on the other site.
Found the following article......

LINK: How Penn State’s groundskeepers prepped the field for four straight home games

https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/5817275/2024/10/04/penn-state-football-beaver-stadium-groundskeepers/

 

[Ward Hog]

It looked immaculate for Illinois, but really bad for UCLA. I noticed it right away and it's not good considering we're considered one of the foremost turf specialty institutions in the world. I could see it in late November, but not now.

 

[Still in State College]

An oldie but a goodie.

https://www.psu.edu/news/athletics/story/new-sod-installation-underway-beaver-stadium