Home at Last

Every year since 1970, Royal High School’s seniors were promised that this was the year that they would be able to host football games in their own stadium, according to Tim Piatt, director of student activities.

Tonight--nearly three decades later--the pledge will be upheld.

For the first time in the school’s 29-year history, the varsity football team, the Royal Highlanders, will play on home turf. Today’s 7 p.m. game against Santa Barbara’s San Marcos High School will be in a fully equipped $3.6-million, 5,000-seat stadium.

The gridiron, which also doubles as a soccer field, is surrounded by a 400-meter, all-weather running track and modern lighting that will illuminate the field.

Opening ceremonies, featuring the school’s band, choral ensemble and speakers, kick off the school’s first true home game at 4:30 p.m.

“We had nothing before this,” Principal Doug Huckaby said.

Before that, the team played at Moorpark College. “Though they were extremely accommodating, it just wasn’t our home site,” he said. “The problem was that you had to transport all your players, your cheerleaders, your equipment--basically, the whole community.”

There was a playing field where the new Highlander Stadium now stands, Piatt said.

Freshman football and soccer games were held there, but it didn’t have enough bleachers to hold the visitors who come to varsity football games, he said.

Until the late 1980s, Royal athletes would go to Simi Valley High School to play games. The past nine years, they have been bused eight or nine miles to play home games at Moorpark College’s Griffin Stadium.

Royal High football coach Gene Uebelhardt said the best part about the new stadium is that “we never have to get on a bus again” for home games.

“It’s the biggest thing that ever happened at this school and one of the biggest things to happen in the community,” he said.

While he appreciates the new stadium, Uebelhardt said it will take determined players--not a fancy new stadium--to help the varsity team improve its 1-9 record from last year.

Although Royal was built in 1968, ground wasn’t broken for a stadium until November 1995. Heavy rains and a change in the water table caused further delays but the project was finished in March.

In the early 1990s, the school district borrowed $12 million to pay for the stadium and new gyms at Sinaloa and Valley View junior high schools, said Dave Kanthak, assistant superintendent of business services. The loan won’t be paid off until 2022, so the total bill to the district--including interest--will be $31 million, Kanthak said.

A $7,500 donation from the Running Rebels youth track club and portions of a $20,000 gift from Coca-Cola will go to pay for some of the stadium’s extras, including high-jump pits, starting blocks, sideline markers, benches, a public announcement system and soccer goals. The city’s two Rotary clubs also pledged about $19,000, which will probably pay for scoreboards, Piatt said.

The long wait has almost been worth it, Piatt said.

The press box is about seven stories high, posing as a potential vertical rival to the city’s tallest building, the Farmers Insurance Los Angeles Regional Office on Cochran Street, Piatt said.

“And just sitting up there in the 30th row [of bleachers] commands a spectacular view of Simi Valley,” he said. “It’s just great to come in the evening and watch a football game and have those mountains in the background.”

Although this will be the first varsity football game played at the stadium, the freshman and sophomore teams played Thursday night as a dress rehearsal for the big show tonight, Piatt said.

And the 1997 graduating class used the stadium for its commencement ceremonies this summer.

After Royal’s teams pin down their schedules, Piatt said, the stadium will be opened to the community. A school band competition may be hosted there as well as dog training sessions for the Simi Valley Police Department.

Senior Braden Fien, the varsity team’s quarterback, doesn’t care what goes on at the stadium any other time of year, as long as he gets to play under the lights tonight and for the rest of the season.

“The intensity level is really going to be up,” he said. “Who knows? There might be thousands of people there. All my family and my parents’ friends are coming. They’ve been talking about this for like six months.”

FYI

The Royal High stadium’s box office opens today at 4 p.m. General admission to the football game is $5. It’s $3 for children 12 and younger. Royal students with appropriate identification cards get in free.