All athletic activities continue to be at a standstill in Morgantown, but construction on the buildings that house those sports are still going on as planned.
The biggest of those is the current facelift to the Puskar Center.
The renovations will cover 72,000 square feet of space to go along with an additional 13,700 square feet expansion as well. The project is set to provide West Virginia with newer and bigger locker rooms, coaches offices, position meeting rooms and more.
“To my understanding they continue to work,” director of athletics Shane Lyons said on a conference call with reporters.
March-Westin, the construction company, is handling the project and officials are hoping there are no delays in materials that the projects would need considering the uncertainty in almost all areas. West Virginia continues to lean on them as the process proceeds.
That goes without saying that some of that is beyond the control of both parties, but for now it’s business as usual except for social-distancing practices ongoing at the site.
“Obviously you have manufacturing and different things in different states that are occurring but the work here on campus right now is moving forward,” Lyons said.
The goal is to have football facility, the lower floor and locker room completed by the original early August target date. Even with uncertainty attached to the start of football season for the moment the plan is to hopefully have those facilities ready for the teams to return to when they indeed are needed.
The work on other projects such as the video boards and seating in the Coliseum also are expected to move forward as expected for the time being with hopes of no delays.
There is obviously more time available to get to some of the work being done in the Coliseum, but if football does indeed start on time as Lyons has admittedly optimistically projected meeting that date is key.
“Our hope is to have them completed on the deadline dates,” Lyons said.
Lyons did admit that there have been discussions on other projects that had not been previously started in other areas given what has unfolded with the coronavirus pandemic.
The West Virginia football season is currently slated to open Sept. 5 in Atlanta against Florida State, while the basketball program does not play its first scheduled regular season game until Nov. 10 in the Coliseum against Fairleigh Dickinson.
----------
• Talk about it with West Virginia fans on The Blue Lot.
• SUBSCRIBE today to stay up on the latest on Mountaineer sports and recruiting.
• Get all of our WVU videos on YouTube by subscribing to the WVSports.com Channel
• Follow us on Twitter: @WVSportsDotCom, @rivalskeenan, @PatrickKotnik
•Like us on Facebook
