I did post this as a possibility several months ago on either this board or the other board as it was an agenda item at a membership, executive board, or committee meeting. Looks like it may very well be coming to fruition.
Class 3 and Class 4 Title Games Moving For 2026…
- Thread starter Virginia HS Football Fan
- Start date
I heard this a couple of weeks ago. It certainly seems to be legit. The VHSL will save quite a bit of money playing at SS over JMU, LU, ODU, UVA, VT, etc...
IMO the venue's size is perfect for the crowd size that is generated for a VA football state championship game. 10,000 will look good in that stadium vs LU or JMU. If this goes well, I wouldn't be shocked to see all 6 over the course of 2 or 3 days.
I hope they increase and improve food options. Research what other facilities do well with concessions and implement those. I mean no slight to the Lions club, they do a great job. But... for big level games there needs to be more options, more vendors around the property with more offerings, and to speed up the lines.(This was a problem at LU also- people in line for concessions missing significant minutes of a whole quarter) This would help with RC games also, and maybe to regain the Stagg Bowl or the CIAA game.
IMO the venue's size is perfect for the crowd size that is generated for a VA football state championship game. 10,000 will look good in that stadium vs LU or JMU. If this goes well, I wouldn't be shocked to see all 6 over the course of 2 or 3 days.
I hope they increase and improve food options. Research what other facilities do well with concessions and implement those. I mean no slight to the Lions club, they do a great job. But... for big level games there needs to be more options, more vendors around the property with more offerings, and to speed up the lines.(This was a problem at LU also- people in line for concessions missing significant minutes of a whole quarter) This would help with RC games also, and maybe to regain the Stagg Bowl or the CIAA game.
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I like the games at Liberty, but it comes off quite cavernous. Not as bad as JMU where attendance there has been pathetic for the upper classes. Also at Liberty, that place was staffed to the bare minimum. The lack of concessions was insulting to be honest.
I like the games at Salem although the stadium is starting to show its age. I agree with you on food options there. The City needs to bring in as many outside vendors as possible to give fans options.
Also, I’d love to see the VHSL go back to a smarter scheduling situation. 3pm and 7pm on Friday and then 12:00pm and 4:00pm on Saturday is ideal. Five and a half hours between start times is insanely too long.
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Salem stadium showing its age. I hate to hear this, but I think you’re right. That’s the collesium. Lots of Salem football identity tied up in that structure.
What could be done to improve it? Kinda feel like with the concrete structure it would be difficult to upgrade unfortunately but I’m not an engineer. What kinda of modern features would you like to see at a site hosting the states. @Virginia HS Football Fan
What could be done to improve it? Kinda feel like with the concrete structure it would be difficult to upgrade unfortunately but I’m not an engineer. What kinda of modern features would you like to see at a site hosting the states. @Virginia HS Football Fan
I will address both points.
The easy one is that I would love a boutique style stadium which seats 10,000 with plenty of hillside seating to get you to 15,000 (or even more just in.case) like Salem has but have that stadium be located in Central Virginia. The design could be super basic as well.
I did the rare C6/C1 Double this past Fall so I visited Salem Stadium. I found the stadium to be dirty along with eroding paint from the bleachers along with cracked concrete. I think a deep cleaning and patchwork would help. The great thing about Salem is that you have plenty of close parking. But again, there are a lack of built-in concession stands to give the stadium a big time feel. Also, I don’t think there are any concessions on the visitors side but I might be wrong there.
I have been to Salem Stadium multiple times as a fan and as a broadcaster. It’s a great place to catch a game.
For Salem, you can almost have a festival type atmosphere with food trucks lining the upper ring on the outside portion of the walkway. Maybe they should also consider cutting in staggered layers into the hillside so folks can have a few areas of steps to walk down and then move to the side on a flatter hillside area to park their lawn chairs.
We just don’t have that many Salem-sized stadiums in Virginia which could provide a great atmosphere for the state title games like Salem. And it’s quite unfortunate.
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I think two things are driving this... attendance in cost. I don't think attendance improves by moving stat games further west. Casual fans from 703, 757 and 804 are not going to travel out west for a state championship game. If you were to hold it central to 95 in the middle of the state then you get a better crowd.
I remember when games were played in Richmond, they were well attended. If I recall, the last game in the 757, I think it was ODU the crowd was pretty good.
The problem is, if you are holding a game more central, where do you go?
I remember when games were played in Richmond, they were well attended. If I recall, the last game in the 757, I think it was ODU the crowd was pretty good.
The problem is, if you are holding a game more central, where do you go?
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I would love to see the games be held at Robins Stadium on the campus of the University of Richmond. And yes, this topic has been discussed on here several times so I won't push for that. Ideally, if it was fixed up nice, I wouldn't mind seeing games played at City of Richmond Stadium. It sure can use some modernization (I remember sitting there in the then-concrete stands which were crumbling at the time for the 2003 State Title Game between Massaponax and Hopewell). Maybe it has been modernized since. I don't know. Actually, I did broadcast a scrimmage there around 2008 or 2009 and remember the Press Box being a bit worse for wear. The stadium wasn't much better.
There it goes back to my earlier point though. There aren't many Salem-sized stadiums in Central Virginia for the most part. If you wanted to get technical, the geographic center of the state is in Buckingham County which is 40-41 miles from Liberty University.. It's 46-49 miles from UVA (but their stadium sucks for state title games to be honest...no aura...no atmosphere). Both Liberty's and UVA's stadiums are outliers in the data below.
I put in a search for stadiums of over 7000 capacity (to include Salem Stadium) but below 20000 capacity and their straight line distances from the geographic center of Virginia. I got this:
| Rank | Stadium | Location | Capacity | Distance (Straight Line) | Primary Home Team(s) |
| 1 | Alumni Memorial Field | Lexington | 10,000 | ~42 miles | VMI Keydets |
| 2 | Robins Stadium | Richmond | 8,700 | ~55 miles | Richmond Spiders |
| 3 | Salem Stadium | Salem | 7,157 | ~77 miles | Roanoke Maroons / Salem HS |
| 4 | Zable Stadium | Williamsburg | 12,259 | ~98 miles | William & Mary Tribe |
| 5 | Armstrong Stadium | Hampton | 12,000 | ~118 miles | Hampton Pirates |
| 6 | Mitchell Stadium | Bluefield | 10,000 | ~146 miles | Graham HS (VA) / Bluefield Univ. |
If you take all of the public high schools in Virginia and based the geographic center of the state on the locations of those high schools, the "new" geographic center is now Goochland County. So this chart comes into play:
| Rank | Stadium | Location | Capacity | Straight Line Distance | Primary Home Team(s) |
| 1 | Robins Stadium | Richmond | 8,700 | ~31 miles | Richmond Spiders |
| 2 | Alumni Memorial Field | Lexington | 10,000 | ~80 miles | VMI Keydets |
| 3 | Zable Stadium | Williamsburg | 12,259 | ~81 miles | William & Mary Tribe |
| 4 | Darling Stadium | Hampton | 8,000 | ~102 miles | Hampton HS / Bethel HS |
| 5 | Armstrong Stadium | Hampton | 12,000 | ~104 miles | Hampton Pirates |
| 6 | Salem Stadium | Salem | 7,157 | ~115 miles | Salem HS / Roanoke College |
| 7 | Mitchell Stadium | Bluefield | 10,000 | ~183 miles | Graham HS (VA) |
There's no really great options due to what's available. There are a couple of good to decent options. I know my preference but again, I don't want to beat a dead horse.
Excellent breakdown of options.
Salem VA is Championship City USA. Grew up hating the Spartans (only competitive reasons) but Salem Stadium is the nicest venue in the state and their fans and locals are class acts. I’m not a Robins Stadium or W&M Stadium fan.. Not a bad seat in Salem Stadium and it’s way more intimate than any stadium outside of Armstrong Stadium at Hampton. Great call VHSL.
@CountyBoyGeneral thought you were a Salem fan from some of your posts.
I would like to see them at Robbins stadium in Richmond.
Lots of love and respect for you all’s program but I am not. I am from the area but I’m a Dinwiddie follower. I am looking forward to us coming out there this year.
I don’t think it will ever happen. There is some kind of ordinance that restricts the number of events. I guess to appease the residential neighbors? Of course, Richmond could amend the ordinance, but good luck with that!
It would be really weird for the Salem kids to be in the visitors lockerroom!
I love the thought of playing the games in smaller college venues. I'd add City Stadium in Lynchburg and Hovey Stadium(VA Union) in Richmond to potential venue list. I'd vote rotating 1-3 between Salem/City Stadiums and rotating 4-6 between Hovey/Darling Stadium. Unless their is a HS somewhere in NoVa that can hold 8-10K that we've forgotten about. Keeps the smaller schools playing in the I-81/R29 corridor and bigger schools stay on I-95/64 corridor.
New to the State. Spent 30 years in NC where the state title games there were held at multiple sites like NC State , UNC Chapel Hill , Wake forest , Duke. What I said there is the same thing that is being said here. Smaller college stadiums for the title games. If VA has 6 classifications why not use Richmond, William and Mary
I would love to see the games played at (Virginia state university) for 3 years to see how they would turnout. I'm from the 804 but it would be a nice change. Easy asset to the highway 95,85,460 and also the Tri-Cities offer plenty of restaurants the mall and hotels in area Colonial Heights,Petersburg and hopewell also Chester.
Foster Stadium at VMI has practically no seating on the visitor side. Parking would be INSANE. And for that reason... I'm out!
Play em all in Salem for 1 through 4. Classes 5 and 6 rotate between Darling Stadium in Hampton and Armstrong Stadium at Hampton University.
IF Salem wanted to do it first class they could have the fans of teams waiting to play housed at the baseball field and get them liqoured up like the Strausburg guy!
I think they were considering doing all six classes at the same site but people didn't want Thursday championship games.
The geographic distribution of Class 6 schools and Class 5 schools are significantly different, so it's hard to find a site that is ideal for both.
The geographic distribution of Class 6 schools and Class 5 schools are significantly different, so it's hard to find a site that is ideal for both.
You could do three games a day for two days. 11am/3pm/7pm...Friday and Saturday. Do $20 a ticket a day. All you can eat football. Stay all day and enjoy the games.
Yep. Classes 1,2,3 are geographically closer anyway, so play those 3 on Friday. Play Classes 4,5,6 which should have a further driving time on Saturday.
Seems to me the reigning 1 A champ might have something to say about your Geographical aSSumptions
Not my aSSumption, but everyone's fact, regardless of what Rapp, Rye Cove, or any other one school has to say. That fact is .....A quick AI search gives us the total number of schools in Class 1 through 3 and their average distance from Salem, and we can do the same for Classes 4 through 6. The results? The combined average distance from Salem for the total number of Class 4 through 6 schools is significantly further in distance compared to Classes 1 through 3.
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