Rice Stadium (Rice University)

On July 2, 1988, Rice Stadium hosted a stop on the Monsters of Rock tour. The tour was headlined by Van Halen and also featured Metallica, Scorpions, Dokken, and Kingdom Come. This was also the Texas World Music Festival.

President Kennedy speaks at Rice Stadium on the American space program in 1962

On September 12, 1962, Rice Stadium hosted the speech in which United States President John F. Kennedy challenged Americans to meet his goal, set the previous year, to send a man to the moon by the end of the decade. In the speech, he used a reference to Rice University football to help frame his rhetoric:

"But why, some say, the moon? Why choose this as our goal? And they may well ask, why climb the highest mountain? Why, 35 years ago, fly the Atlantic? Why does Rice play Texas? We choose to go to the moon! We choose to go to the moon in this decade and do the other things, not because they are easy, but because they are hard, because that goal will serve to organize and measure the best of our energies and skills, because that challenge is one that we are willing to accept, one we are unwilling to postpone, and one which we intend to win, and the others, too."

Kennedy's comments implied Rice had a history of losing to Texas; however, the two football teams had split 5–5 in their previous 10 meetings and would tie the following month. On the other hand, Kennedy's comments about Rice-Texas might have been as forward-looking as his statements about going to the moon (which did occur in 1969): Since 1963, Rice has gone just 2-43 against Texas, including 28 straight losses between 1966 and 1993 and 13 straight from 1995 to the present.[8]

As originally built, Rice Stadium seated 70,000, the second-largest stadium in the Southwest Conference (behind the Cotton Bowl). Rice Stadium was built before professional football came to Houston, and 70,000 fans might be expected to attend a college football game there. However, Rice found it increasingly difficult from the 1960s onward to compete against schools that were ten times its size or more, and in some cases had more freshmen than Rice had undergraduates. In 2006, the end zone seats were covered with tarps, reducing seating capacity to 47,000. However, in the event of larger-than-expected crowds, it can easily be expanded to its full capacity, which is larger than the total number of Rice's living alumni. The average attendance for Rice football games in Rice Stadium was 13,353 in 2007.[9] For the 2008 season, average home attendance was 20,179.[10] During the 2009 season, average home attendance dipped once again to 13,552 per game.[11] However, for the 2012 season it was 20,325.[12]

The Brian Patterson Sports Performance Center under construction on Oct. 23, 2015, as seen from the press box.

Around July 2015, construction began on the Brian Patterson Sports Performance Center. This building will make up the north end of the stadium, and contain a weight room, a home team locker room, coaching and staff offices. This will replace the north end seating, and lower possible capacity considerably. However, the seating removed consisted of crude concrete steps, and were rarely used. The building was named for donor and former Rice University football player and alumnus Brian Patterson.

Rice Stadium, Press Box Side 2016

Rice Stadium 2016