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It’s been 30 years since Scott County High School had a football stadium all to itself.
The Cardinals have that now and then some.
Scott County students began school Wednesday (Aug. 14) at a stunning new $130 million campus that includes athletic facilities for all its sports teams and improved amenities for everyone.
Last Friday, the football team held its first scrimmage against defending Class 5A champion Bowling Green on a turf field that has “Scott County” painted in one end zone and “Cardinals” in the other.
Cardinals public address announcer Bill Holland put it best when he pressed his microphone button for the first time ahead of the scrimmage.
“Ladies and gentlemen, welcome home.”
Senior defensive standout Buddy Collins and his teammates could barely wait for the football and lacrosse side of Cardinals Stadium to be completed.
“We would sneak over here and look at it even though it wasn’t complete,” said Collins, a three-star college prospect committed to Navy. “We would just all come over here and look at it as it all came together piece by piece … at least once a week.”
A place of their own
Scott County has been sharing a football field for 30 years, ever since its old home field was demolished to make way for what was then a new high school building that opened in 1996.
The Cardinals first shared a field with Georgetown College at old Hinton Field and later at what is now Toyota Stadium.
Since 2019, the Cardinals have shared “The Birds Nest” at Great Crossing High School with the Warhawks. And even though that site had Cardinals colors painted in one end zone, it wasn’t really home.
“Now we don’t have to get on a bus to go to a ‘home game.’” Collins said. “We can walk down from the school and have our home game right here. It means everything.”
Though decked with red trimmings instead of green, the new Scott County campus bears resemblance to Great Crossing, which opened in 2019 to split the county’s student population in half and relieve overcrowding at what had become the largest high school in the state.
Like at Great Crossing, the new Cardinals Stadium football field backs up to a dedicated soccer field/track complex with a shared press box overlooking both atop an A-frame set of grandstands.
It was soon after Great Crossing opened that the Scott County board of education decided to build another new school to give all of its high school students the same kind of experience.
“We’re so excited for our kids and the opportunities for our community,” Scott County athletic director Steve Helton said. “It’s just a really great time to be in Scott County. It’s a growing community and now we have two state-of-the-art schools for our kids to really put them in positions to be successful.”
Helton, who has been athletic director for a number of years in addition to being the girls basketball coach, was recently named the boys basketball coach. His Cardinals will play in a new gym named for his late mentor. The Billy Hicks Gymnasium will be dedicated during the annual Billy Hicks Classic tournament later this year.
Cardinals getting settled in
A more than 40,000 square foot field house sits next to the football field and contains offices, locker rooms, meeting rooms, a wrestling room and large indoor turf space that can also be turned into batting cages. The cheerleaders had already made themselves at home in the field house, too, rolling out mats on the turf for some practices. New softball and baseball fields are almost complete on the other side of campus.
“One thing about our kids, win, lose or draw, they love football and their families love football,” Scott County football coach Jim McKee said. “And their mommies and daddies want them to be good. So, for them to have this, that’s the thing I’m most happy about.”
Scott County will take advantage of its new surroundings by having seven home games this season.
There’s still much work to do around campus. A number of things in the field house and elsewhere still need paint and polish. McKee said he won’t be ready to hang up any banners or photos for at least six months. He wants his players to live in it a while and get a feel for the place.
Football booster president Brooke Miracle had a crew begin moving wares into the new concession stand a few days before the scrimmage. This year will be the first time in a long time the boosters won’t have to split time at multiple venues with multiple other entities.
“Somebody went to the (old) field house and loaded up what we had over there because we were having to move in between two concession stands, because we had JV and freshman games at the old field house, and then we had our varsity games over at the Birds Nest,” Miracle said.
The new concession stand is a dream.
“I’ve been doing boosters for Scott County for six years, so having our own home field is amazing,” Miracle said. “I am stoked. … It’s great to have all this space.”
Miracle is the daughter of Bill Holland, the P.A. announcer. She graduated from Scott County the first year it was in its 1996 building. Her eldest son, Will, was part of the last graduating class before the creation of Great Crossing. Her youngest, Zachary, is a freshman and will spend all four years at the new school.
Holland has seen it all at Scott County. He began calling games for the school when it had its own field in 1988. He took a break from football for a time, but has always called Cardinals basketball games.
“Thank you Toyota is all I’ve got to say,” he said, smiling. “They moved everybody in here. If Toyota wasn’t here, we’d still be in one school just like everybody else. We’d be a small, little community.”
Holland marveled at the new school and its athletic facilities.
“It’s unbelievable. … I don’t know if anybody in the state has anything better.”
2024 Scott County football schedule
(Home games in all capital letters)
Aug. 23: Franklin County (at Great Crossing)
Aug. 30: GREAT CROSSING
Sept. 6: WALTHER CHRISTIAN ACADEMY (Illinois)
Sept. 13: BOYLE COUNTY
Sept. 20: MADISON CENTRAL
Sept. 27: At Collins
Oct. 4: At Anderson County
Oct. 11: SOUTH OLDHAM
Oct. 18: WOODFORD COUNTY
Nov. 1: LEXINGTON CATHOLIC
