There’s no place like (a new) home for Warhawks and Bears

As far as those in charge of big projects go, John Bennett is a veteran.

He, like others in the same position, take very seriously the job at hand, whether it’s a new high school or a new high school stadium.

Take the new football home for Veterans and Houston County, a project costing more than $12 million that’s located about three dozen long passes from Houston County’s practice field and 10 minutes or so from Veterans.

“I graduated from Houston County and built Veterans,” said Bennett, a superintendent at Parrish Construction Group and the project manager. “So I have a little stake in the game.”

Adding to Bennett’s focus is the fact that this is his final job in this position, around here, with Parrish. Once it’s complete, and that turnover date is Aug. 17, he accelerates the packing job as he and his family move to Colorado for a similar position.

So there’s little doubt that anything will be overlooked in the building of Freedom Field in Warner Robins.

Freedom Field sits at the corner of Bear Country Boulevard and Cohen Walker Drive, the main entry gate sitting about a half mile from Houston County’s primary practice field, and about 7  1/2 miles from Veterans.

The process has been fairly routine, with weather mostly cooperating and the coordination of such a project with several different groups involved going well.

“The whole process has been interesting,” said Scott Hill, the county board’s director of facilities. “We’re building schools and additions, and remodeling education facilities. To do something like this and see it come together, it’s just neat to be a part of.”

Freedom Field shares similarities with McConnell-Talbert, the seemingly forever home to Warner Robins and Northside, as well as to Houston County for about three decades, and that was by design.

“We tried to have equity,” Hill said. “Realistically, our tradition was at McConnell-Talbert, and we didn’t want to take anything away from what kind of brought the publicity of football to the county.”

On the other hand, the two don’t look very much alike.

McConnell-Talbert is all concrete, and rises up fairly steeply.

Seating covers only from one 20 yardline to the other, as well as being home to the top track in the county. It is somewhat imposing, and has led to impressive — albeit wildly overstated — crowd estimates for many of the scores of huge games it has hosted.

“McConnell-Talbert, it looks a lot bigger,” said Bennett, a defensive end under former head coach Doug Johnson. “This is more of a streamlined structure, with the aluminum bleachers and that stuff. it doesn’t look as massive.”

Seating capacity, based on the GHSA’s 24-inch definition of seat size, is very similar, with McConnell-Talbert holding about 100 more fans in the stands at 6,200. Hill said capacity would be a little more than 8,000 under the old 18-inch-per-seat standard

Freedom Field has a lower level of seating with a walkway between it and the upper level. The game operations boxes on both sides for game management, coaches and media are the same, although the home side has four rooms to three on the visitors’ side. At McConnell-Talbert, the home side is different than the visitors’ side, and neither side has separate rooms for users.

That main entry gate faces a huge parking lot that will hold almost 1,500 vehicles, with entry access from Bear Country and Cohen Walker.

Additional parking on the back side of Houston County High is about a five-minute walk.

McConnell-Talbert, which has undergone about $4 million of renovations and upgrades the past three years, has been Houston County’s home away from home since the school’s debut season in 1991. Veterans, meanwhile, played home games at Perry for its first six seasons.

So, yes indeed, that anticipation only grows and grows is an understatement.

Coaches from both schools are regular visitors, as have been players from, well, the school a short walk away.

“There have been a few times when we’ve had players on it,” Bennett said. “And we have to make a phone call.”

Veterans head coach David Bruce said he stops by about three or four times a week, including as recently as Thursday when work was being done on putting the mascots’ names in the end zone.

“That end zone of ours, with the red end zone, white letters with the royal blue outline?” Bruce said. “Bam. That looks pretty now. And ‘Freedom Field’ in the middle in red, white and blue? That looks pretty.”

The Warhawks and Bears will get some practice time in before the season starts, but neither will scrimmage in the new facility.

And, of course, the real raising of the curtain is on Sept. 9 when the two teams that call Freedom Field home play each other, with Veterans “at” Houston County.

By then, the Warhawks will have played games at Northgate, Dublin and Worth County, and the Bears will have battled Mary Persons, Peach County and Eagle’s Landing, the latter at home. The past two seasons, the teams opened against each other at McConnell-Talbert in the first two games of the series.

And the soccer programs for both school are just as ecstatic, since the Bears and Warhawks — both with mighty proficient boys and girls soccer teams — can utilize the new digs, as well.

Adults are at least as amped, if not more so, than those who will be competing in the stadium, and Hill is one with great anticipation.

“The community takes a lot of pride in athletics, and this is something they’ve been wanting for a long time,” he said. “To feel the excitement from the schools, from the students, from the administration and the community is pretty cool.”

This story was originally published July 16, 2016 at 5:40 PM with the headline "There’s no place like (a new) home for Warhawks and Bears."