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Mark Dantonio discusses importance of updated facilities: ‘We’re gonna have to move on that’
By Dave Holcomb
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Michigan State football hasn’t done the best job of keeping up with elite football programs around the country that are building new facilities left and right. But it sounds like that will change in Lansing very soon.
According to Chris Solari with the Detroit Free Press, when asked about Northwestern’s new $260 million athletic complex this week, which has a beautiful view of Lake Michigan, that opened in 2018, Dantonio responded by saying “that’s something that will be addressed here as well in the near future.”
Back in July at Big Ten media days, he also said this:
“When you look around this room, everybody is operating in new facilities, with new expansions,” he said this past summer in Chicago. “At some point in time, we’re gonna have to move on that. I would prefer it be now, but that’s not up to me. But I do think that there’s a grassroots movement — not within the athletic administration, but among others at the university – that indicate that there is a push for that.”
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Michigan State deputy athletic director Alan Haller seems to be on the same page. He told the Detroit Free Press this week that he and Dantonio “were part of meetings” to “discuss planning for upgrades to help the program” both in the short and long-term.
“We had a conversation just (last Wednesday) about the facility plan for the future,” Haller said. “And he is engaged in what we are thinking about five, six, seven years from now as he is about some of the updates we’re going to do after the season. He is totally involved in those plans.
“He’s not just thinking about tomorrow. He is thinking about what this program is going to look like five to 10 years from now, from a facilities standpoint, from a personnel standpoint.”
A new facility plan could be used for a number of projects, all of which would be to improve the football team’s standing in the “arms race” that is to become the program with the biggest and best equipment and facilities to attract the best recruits.