Texas high school gets new 10,000 seat, $35M football stadium

INDIANAPOLIS (WISH) — When I first moved to Indiana in 2007, I was shocked by the high school sports facilities. I grew up in New York City, where my high school didn’t even have a football team, so when I first saw the stadiums that local kids get to play in, I was stunned. Fast forward 16 years later. Now a part of the Indiana community and having attended a number of Friday night games at some of these stadiums, the novelty has faded. Been there, done that. Football games in big stadiums on Friday nights are what we do here in Indiana during the fall.

Enter Melissa, Texas.

As I sat at my desk in the WISH-TV newsroom, I come across a post on social media about a new high school football stadium in this small Texas town. The new facility’s price tag: $35 million. Now, we’ve all heard the saying that everything is bigger in Texas, but “this is ridiculous” I thought, and then, I did some digging.

Here’s what I found: Melissa is about 40 miles northeast of Dallas with a population of almost 20,000. Melissa High School’s population is just 1,300, but the town is considered one of the fastest growing in the state. Nestled into Collin County, the town listed a population of 19,357 on the 2022 U.S. Census, which is almost five times its population from 2010. Because of the population boom, the school’s football moved up into Texas’ 5A-D2 level. In April, the school announced it was building the brand-new, state-of-the-art football stadium and indoor practice facility. Construction finished on the 10,000-seat stadium and its facilities earlier this summer ahead of the team’s preseason workouts and first game on Sept. 1.

There is no doubt we take high school sports seriously here in the Hoosier state, but judging by this stadium and others in Texas, “the Lone Star State” is on a different level.