Josh Heupel goes in depth on the impact of renovations to Neyland Stadium

Tennessee‘s Neyland Stadium has been under construction since the Sunday following the Volunteers’ final home game of the 2021 season. The Vols stadium is set to be remodeled with a party deck, sports bar, as well as a new video board thanks to a $180 million renovation package, and head coach Josh Heupel can’t wait for the project to be complete.

“For us on the football side of it, exciting about the renovations, the expansion of our current Anderson Training facility,” Heupel said. “Great players lounge, recovery area. Over $100 million project in reinvigorating Neyland Stadium, which is one of the great venues in college sports. So much excitement that exists.

“A great amount of that is due to our leadership: Danny White, our athletic director; Chancellor Plowman; and our president, Randy Boyd. Great leadership that has a vision of how we want to compete, giving our players all the resources they need, and they’re going to go out and chase it every single day for us. It’s been fun.”

This isn’t the first time Neyland Stadium has undergone renovations recently, as the stadium was upgraded with a state of the art LED lighting system that showed off some awe-inspiring lighting displays before Volunteer home games.

Firework machines were equipped on the roof of the north end zone as well as west and east skybox rooftops to “provided more emphatic celebrations for Tennessee touchdowns and victory.” This, along with the currently renovations improves Neyland Stadium, as well as the fan’s (and more importantly, the recruits) experience at Rocky Top on any given Saturday.

“Absolutely imperative that you use those opportunities,” Heupel said about taking advantage of stadium renovations. “That’s true of official visits, but it’s true of unofficial visits, as well. When we get recruits up to Knoxville, Tennessee, they see the river, they see Vol Walk, they see the game day environment with over 100,000 people there. It gives them a great perspective on this being college football as good as it gets.

“Then it’s up to the culture piece to find out if it’s the right fit for them. Those are great weekends for us. We got a bunch of home games here against really good opponents inside of this league that will be great recruiting weekends for us.”