FIU Football Stadium
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R. Kirk Landon Football Fieldhouse
FIU's new football headquarters is named after Trustee R. Kirk Landon, in appreciation of his $1 million donation to Panthers football.
The two-story, 50,000-square-foot R. Kirk Landon Football Fieldhouse is located on the west end of FIU stadium.
“This is just the latest example of Mr. Landon’s contributions to FIU and its athletic programs,” said FIU Executive Director of Sports and Entertainment Pete Garcia. “His leadership and financial support have helped us take FIU to Division I status and build a successful athletics program. We thank him for helping make the fieldhouse a reality.”
The fieldhouse’s highlight is a 14,000-square foot, clear-span weight room that will be used by all FIU student-athletes for strength and conditioning.
The first floor also features an equipment room, full-service athletic training facility, ticket office, merchandise area and 8,500-square-feet of locker rooms for student-athletes and coaches. The reception area will include an Athletics Hall of Fame.
The fieldhouse’s second floor includes coaches’ offices, a theater-style team meeting room and six breakout rooms overlooking the field. These rooms also open to an outdoor deck that are used for recruiting and game-day suites.
“Trustee Landon’s ongoing support is crucial as we build our athletics program at FIU,” said FIU President Modesto A. Maidique at the time. “Athletics will be key in helping FIU achieve national prominence.”
Landon is the president of two charitable organizations, the Kirk Foundation and the Kirk A. and Dorothy P. Landon Foundation. He served as CEO of American Bankers Insurance Group until 1995 and chairman of its Board of the Directors until his retirement in 1999.
He is actively involved in community philanthropy and serves on the boards of the Zoological Society of Florida, Arts for Learning and the Community Partnership for the Homeless. Landon's involvement with FIU dates back to the University's earliest days, when he served on the University’s 1972 advisory board and the University Founders Council.
In 2004, Mr. Landon made what was then the single largest donation from an individual in FIU’s history to create the R. Kirk Landon Undergraduate School of Business.
Lime Court at FIU Arena
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Since the opening of FIU Arena on February 1, 1986, opponents quickly learned that winning basketball games on the Modesto A. Maidique Campus would be no easy task. It began early in 1986-87, while FIU was still a fledgling Division II program, with an overtime win over Dartmouth, and continued with exciting Division I victories over the Big Ten’s Michigan, Trans America Athletic Conference champion College of Charleston, in-state rival South Florida and the longest game played in the NCAA in 2004-05 when the Panthers outlasted Sun Belt Conference foe Arkansas-Little Rock, 118-114, in five overtimes.
FIU’s best season at home was 1997-98 when the Panthers won a school-record 13 games. The longest winning streak in arena history was 18 from February 15, 1997 through November 29, 1998. The 2012-13 season marked the fifth time that the program had posted double-digit wins in the venue.
A full array of activities has taken place in this 94,000 square-foot multi-purpose facility. Sporting events, concerts, banquets, trade shows, graduations, convocation ceremonies and other University and community events have all been accommodated.
In the Spring of 2011, construction on the east side of the Panther’s home began. An 11,000 sqaure-foot addition is slated to be completed by Decmeber of 2011 and will feature added concessions, box offices, restrooms, meeting rooms and merchandising areas. Two large gameday suites will also be completed. Each will be about 1,000 square feet in size.
The main court is a Cincinnati Robbins perma-cushion maple wood basketball floor, made up of some 19,000 square feet of wood. Four retractable basketball backboards allow for the floor to be divided into two practice courts, while Spalding portable basketball standards are used for intercollegiate competition. The Arena has an overall seating capacity of 5,000.
In mid-April of 2013, FIU completed the resurfacing of the court. With its one-of-a-kind look the new floor, featuring a beach scene, is something that is expected to attract recruits and provide a home-court advantage. On Aug. 23, 2013, FIU announced a partnership with Lime Fresh Mexican Grill (Downtown Dadeland & West Kendall) in which the “Not Your Average Burrito Joint” secured the naming rights for the court at FIU Arena.
The facility added a brand-new score board and video board in the Spring of 2011. At 24 feet by 16 feet, the state-of-the-art Daktronics scoreboard features a 14 feet by 9 feet video board which will play highlights, advertisements and be a major part of the gameday experience at FIU Arena.
Support areas include an equipment room, training room and eight different, full-service dressing rooms. Academic space in the building includes three classrooms, and physiology, computer and kinesiology laboratories.
In the summer of 2010, construction on the facilities athletic lockerrooms took place. The crown jewel of that project was the completion of the men’s and women’s basketball lockerrooms. Each NBA-quality lockerroom is 2,000 square feet and feature a team meeting room and separate coaches lockerrooms.
The FIU Arena also houses offices and board rooms for FIU athletic administrators and a state-of-the-art, 4,500 square-foot athletic training center that opened in the fall of 2006.
The facility features a hydrotherapy room, which includes custom-built, underground hot and cold plunge pools and a therapy pool with an underwater treadmill, a doctor’s examination room, functional training area, rehabilitation area with 12 treatment tables and an audio-visual system that includes high definition and flat screen televisions for comfort and convenience.
FIU Baseball Stadium
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FIU plays all its home games at FIU Baseball Stadium on the campus of University Park. The Gus Alfonso Family Locker Room, a fully-equipped training room, spacious dugouts, indoor hitting facilities and full bullpens in the right and left field foul territories creates an ideal setting for student-athletes and coaches. A seating capacity of 2,000 with unmatched sight lines, scoreboard, elevator, concession stands and stadium lighting provide a fan-friendly atmosphere that makes this house a home for the Golden Panthers.
While the stadium has the amenities and necessities essential to a successful baseball program, improving the facility is a constant process. In just the last year, the coaches’ offices, alumni lounge and media area was completed on the third floor of the stadium, creating an area for those who helped build the program.
Head coach Turtle Thomas and his staff have led a charge to further advance the stadium with new carpeting in the locker room and training room, adding pad and decals to the outfield fences, add a state-of-the art video board, expand the batting cages, upgraded the press box and suite area, construct a new weight room and add a family area in right field.
The evolution of FIU Baseball Stadium did not happen overnight. The completion of Phase I of a three-phase project that switched the positioning of the field culminated with a 1-0 win against Bethune-Cookman on Jan. 26, 1996 in front of a standing-room crowd. Fireworks and a first-ball ceremony that featured University President Dr. Modesto Maidique and many other dignitaries were part of the festivities.
Phase II construction, which increased the stadium’s seating capacity by more than 1,000, forced the Golden Panthers to play in Homestead for some time before returning in 2002. More than $3.5 million was raised from student trust funds to complete the first two phases and former head coach Danny Price raised $100,000 to fund the construction of the batting cages.
The expansion enabled FIU to host the 2005 Sun Belt Conference Tournament. Phase III of the project got underway in the spring of 2003 and was completed in 2007 with the finishing of the skybox, alumni lounge and media area.
The field's playing surface is natural grass and the symmetrical field with dimensions of 325 feet down the lines, 375 feet in the power alleys, and 400 feet to straightaway center field.
Scheduling
Those interested in scheduling their next function at one of our facilities should contact Wes Hardin, Associate AD, Facilities and Operations. Questions may be directed to Hardin at whardin@fiu.edu or call (305) 348-4327.
