Tenney Stadium at Leonidoff Field

The grandstand at Tenney Stadium at Leonidoff Field is a long block of grey stone. The field beneath it is artificial turf, a green rectangle marked with white lines. You can see the goalposts at either end, but the real feature is the way the stands sit back from the touchline.

The stadium opened in 1968 as Leonidoff Field, but the current appearance belongs to a renovation that finished in 2007. The old wooden stands were removed and replaced with this concrete beast, a decision made by the architects at Skidmore, Owings & Merrill. They kept the sightlines simple. There are no luxury boxes jutting out over the crowd, just a long press box running the length of the main stand. The capacity sits at 5,000, though most of those are on the grassy slope behind the seating. The stone facing on the lower tier is rough, the same material used in the retaining wall that separates the pitch from the walkway.

Marist University football teams play here, and they wear red and white. The uniforms in the photographs show the red jerseys clearly, and the helmets are white with a red stripe. The players huddle near the sideline, away from the main stand, where the coaches stand in casual clothes. The atmosphere is quiet when the players are not on the pitch. The only noise comes from the wind moving through the trees behind the opposite end of the field. The ground holds its own history without shouting for attention. It is a place built for observation, with the stone walls closing in on the field, forcing the eye to follow the action on the grass.