Lights at Lyons Stadium should be ready for Tuesday's home game

Two of the Nevada Tigers' biggest fans, Chase and Alisha Brown, watched as Nevada soundly beat the Butler Bears Thursday afternoon at Champion Diamonds. Thanks to the help of Dr. Russ Kemm and the Champion Diamonds crew, the Tigers were able to use the field near U.S. 71 Highway while Lyons Stadium had new lights installed. The Tigers will be back at Lyons Stadium for four home games this week, as the lights should be ready to go by Tuesday.

Herald-Tribune

NEVADA, Mo. -- The new lights at Lyons Stadium should be up and operational by Tuesday, Nevada Parks and Recreation Director Carol Branham said Friday.

The lights, which were originally scheduled to be finished last week, took longer than expected to install because of drilling problems when creating the holes for the light poles.

The installers ran into rock while drilling the holes and had to hire an outside company out of St. Louis that had the necessary equipment to penetrate it.

While financial costs associated with hiring the extra drilling company had been planned for, the timeline for completion needed to be adjusted.

The holes were finally completed Wednesday, and the lights were all scheduled to be up in the air by the end of the day Friday.

Branham said after the holes were ready that she told the parties involved how urgent it was that things be completed by Tuesday, when the Nevada Tigers are scheduled to host Clinton.

"I said 'We have to have the lights up, tested and working by Tuesday,'" Branham said.

As of noon Friday, the third of eight light poles was being set.

Mike Ast, the facilities operations manager for the Parks and Recreation Department, said barring an unforeseen setback, the lights would be ready to go Tuesday.

"As near as I can tell, at this point, we've had a really good week," Ast said.

The only thing that could possibly keep the lights from being functional by Tuesday would be if a transformer that was ordered by Aquila was unable to arrive on its scheduled date Monday.

"Aquila's been great," Branham said. "I don't want it to sound like it's all on them."

Apparently once the lights were installed on the poles, Aquila found that the transformer they originally had planned to use wasn't going to work, prompting the ordering of a new one.

The worst-case scenario would be that the lights will be up by Tuesday but not yet in working order. If that were the case, the game would still be held at Lyons Stadium, but the start time of 4:30 p.m. would be moved up to 4 p.m. to allow the junior varsity more time to play after the varsity concludes.

"We're not going to think like that," Branham said. "We're going to expect that things will go fine and the lights will be ready (Tuesday)."

Branham said the whole department was excited about the lights being completed.

"This will be the completion of the first project completed under the new Parks and Rec. sales tax passed in April 2005," she said.

The winning bid for the lights project was supposed to cost the city $261,500, plus an additional $18,000 in case an extra drilling company was needed. The approved financing for the project was $305,000.

Without having a final invoice, Branham said the project should come in comfortably under the budget dictated by the winning bid.

Scheduled home games this past week were held at Champion Diamonds, as owner Dr. Russ Kemm and his crew opened their arms to the Tigers when it was realized that Lyons Stadium wouldn't be ready.