AROUND THE B1G: Who has the best locker rooms in the Big Ten?
Last week the Rutgers Football program unveiled a brand new locker room after Greg and Anna Brown made the decision to donate $4 million towards the project late last year.
With the Scarlet Knights getting a new locker room, we've decided to go one by one checking out what all the football locker rooms in the Big Ten look like compared to Rutgers.
The Illinois Fighting Illini football program is currently in the process of something similar to the R Fund, with something that they call the I Fund. The fund is meant to help Illinois Athletics raise enough money to get new facilities which include a new football locker room. Below you can see a video of what the Illini football team locker room looks like currently, as well as a couple artist renderings of what their new locker room will eventually look like.
In April of 2018, the Indiana Hoosiers received a $2 million gift from former Hoosiers football player Terry Tallen, which was used to renovate the Hoosiers football team locker room. The new football facility and locker room should be unveiled shortly, but in the mean time you can take a quick look below at the artist renderings of the new Terry Tallen Football Facility.
Similar to Rutgers Football, the Maryland Terrapins football program is in the midst of a facilities upgrade. The Terps locker room is considered part of a $196 million renovation that started back in 2015. According to Quinn Evans Architects, the newly renovated field house will include two full-length outdoor football practice fields, locker rooms, a 26,000-square-foot strength and conditioning center, hydrotherapy and other training facilities, a 180-seat theater-style team meeting room, position meeting rooms, a 230-seat cafeteria, recruiting lounge, and staff offices for the university's football program. It will also have a tunnel leading the facility to the Terps home turf -- Capital One Field.
Below you can see a quick picture of the current locker, a video showing the entire locker and an artist rendering of what the new locker room is expected to look like.
The Hawkeyes also renovated their locker room back in August of 2015 as part of a series of renovation for the Richard O. Jacobson Football Operations Building built back in 1995.
According to http://www.Now.UIowa.Edu the facility will also feature "an exhibit space dedicated to the history and success of the Hawkeyes, a room which will honor Iowa’s consensus All-Americans that also will serve as a location for team activities, hospitality, and special events, a strength and conditioning area, team locker rooms, team meeting rooms, state-of-the-art technology for training, coaching, and recruiting, office space for the coaching and support staffs, an equipment room, and athletic training rooms."
In the video below you can see the entire Iowa football performance center or if you want to just see the locker room start the video at 11:57.
The Wolverines have one of the older looking locker rooms in the conference and for the time being no update has been discussed at this point.
Below is a couple of pictures of what the current locker room looks like.
Back in late 2015, the Michigan State football program received a slight upgrade to their locker room thanks to Britten Studios.
In the video below you can see the entire MSU football facility or if you want to just see the locker room start the video at 0:55.
In early 2018, the Minnesota Golden Gophers football program finished up a $166 million project called Minnesota Athlete's Village. The Village was a combination of three buildings -- Land O’Lakes Center For Excellence, the Charlie and Kathy Cunningham Basketball Performance Center and the David and Janis Larson Football Performance Center. The football performance center included locker rooms, weight rooms, training rooms, lounges, offices for the football team, and the Indoor Football Practice Facility.
Below you can see a quick walk through video of the new look locker rooms.
The current Nebraska Football locker room was built in the mid-2000s and has seen several slight upgrades since then. However head coach Scott Frost recently told the press at B1G Media Day he is hoping to get some more upgrades to the facilities soon.
“At some point we’re going to have to do something,” Frost said at B1G Media Day. “Really what you want to do is give high school kids as many reasons as possible as you can give them to come to Lincoln, Nebraska, and play football. If that means we need to upgrade in some way, shape or form, then I hope we come to the right decision there.”
Below you can see a quick video tour of the Nebraska Football players lounge and locker room. If you want to see just the locker room skip to 2:39 in the video.
NORTHWESTERN WILDCATS
The Wildcats had a new locker room officially built and unveiled in August of 2018. The locker room was part of a $270 million project called the Walter Athletic Center.
Here is a quick quote from Northwestern Univ. on what else included in the Athletic Center.
"The Ryan Fieldhouse will provide one of the most versatile practice, competition, and recreation venues in the nation. The new fieldhouse will have the capacity for not only football practice, but also lacrosse. The consolidation of athletic facilities on the main campus allows for direct adjacencies of the new sports performance facilities for football and Olympic sports, a new sports medicine and athletic training center, and a student-athlete training table. The fieldhouse will also include locker rooms for multiple Wildcats varsity programs and Wilson Field, a full-sized indoor athletic field that will enable Northwestern’s student-athletes to practice and/or compete indoors during inclement weather."
Starting at the 1:00 minute mark below you can see a tour of the new look locker room.
The Ohio State Buckeyes redid their locker room in the summer of 2014. According to The Lantern the newly renovated football locker rooms at the Woody Hayes Athletic Center cost $2.5 million to renovate the entire facility.
You can check out the video below to get a quick view of the OSU locker room.
In early August 2016, the Penn State football program officially revealed the new and improved Lasch Locker Room. The whole project cost around $12 million and took about a whole year to complete.
Below is a video showing the players reactions as well as a quick look through of the recently renovated locker room.
In 2015, the Purdue Athletic Department made a commitment to send $60 million to upgrade the programs out of date football facilities. The project broke ground in May of 2016 and was finished later in the fall of 2017.
Within the project was a new football locker room, which you can check out in the video below.
Earlier this year, the Wisconsin Badgers football program also received a new locker room. Below is a quick video posted on Twitter courtesy of the Wisconsin Football program.
