Last Saturday, Georgetown inaugurated a momentous new era for campus athletics, when the Hoya football team played its first game under the lights of Multi-Sport Field.
Naturally Georgetown didn’t want the change to be too jarring, so the Hoyas kept to tradition by losing to Lafayette, 28-3. But while we may have learned that the Hoya offense is afraid of the dark, Saturday’s game revealed something more important—a little bit of illumination is a big deal.
Almost 3,000 fans showed up to watch the Hoyas take on the Leopards, a crowd larger than any from last season (save the homecoming game). The fans may have left disappointed, but for Georgetown football, getting people in the seats is half the battle.
The players also knew they were in for something special. Playing under the lights was the talk of the team last week.
“It’s going to be crazy,” sophomore defensive back Wayne Heimuli told GUHoyas.com before the game. “Just being able to play under the lights like we did in high school, it’s going to be a good experience. It may not be Friday Night Lights, but it could be Saturday Night Fever.”
Saturday didn’t mark the first game played under the lights—that honor went to a women’s lacrosse match against Syracuse last spring—but it marked the arrival of a bright future for Georgetown sports. Even if it’s not quite Georgetown’s, football is America’s game, and finally playing it at night shows that the University is dedicated to athletic pursuits besides those played on hardwood.
The lights are hardly just the boosters’ gift to football. In fact, last Saturday is the only night game on the football schedule this season. The real effect of the lights will be much less noticeable (unless you happen to live on the north side of Kennedy). Georgetown’s student-athletes—from the varsity to the intramural level—have been given a few more hours of field time every day.
Getting space for regular practice was never a real problem for Georgetown’s major varsity sports, but with lighting only available on the less-than-desirable Kehoe Field, club sport athletes often struggled for a place to play. Now they can more easily schedule practices and games, at a time more convenient for students who never committed to making the sacrifices that playing a collegiate varsity sport requires.
One such club sport is Georgetown’s men’s rugby team. Although Georgetown rugby is a powerhouse, reaching the national semifinals two times since 2005, the team was a victim of the University’s field shortage, scrounging for practice time and searching the city for sites for “home” games. The lights are a boon to a team whose volunteer coaches make daytime practices impossible.
“Club sports and intramural sports have gotten an assist from the varsity sports program. They’ve developed more organization and extended a hand to club sports in that they’re giving us more field space regularly and giving us times to go out on to the field,” said rugby captain Phil Cooney. “Now we’re going to have practice fields every week, which is great.”
That would not have been possible before the lights went up on Multi-Sport. Rugby will even get to share in some of the glamour of the lights, with three night games currently scheduled this fall, including one against University of Virginia this Saturday.
These are the kinds of opportunities that Georgetown should be making available to its student-athletes, the vast majority of whom will never play on ESPN. By illuminating Multi-Sport Field the University has given these underexposed players their own moment in the spotlight.
