McCarthy Stadium
| The Mac | |
 |
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| Location | 1900 W. Olney Ave. Philadelphia, PA 19141 |
|---|---|
| Owner | La Salle University |
| Operator | La Salle University |
| Capacity | 7,500 |
| Construction | |
| Broke ground | 26 August 1936 |
| Opened | 31 October 1936 |
| Tenants | |
| La Salle Explorers (Soccer, Lacrosse) |
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McCarthy Stadium, The Mac, is a 7,500-seat multi-purpose stadium in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. It is home to the La Salle University Explorers men's and women's soccer teams. It was previously the home to the university's American football team until it was discontinued in 2007 after a seven-year revival. The facility opened in 1936. Its field is surrounded by a six lane, one-quarter mile track.
The original football field ran perpendicular to today's configuration, and the fifty yards of gridiron nearest the current scoreboard are essentially the result of a substantial landfill operation by Joseph M. Crowley during the mid-1930s. The above landfill involved several men and a horse to gradually level the countless truckloads of dirt, rocks, bricks, concrete, and asphalt (each load cost La Salle about twenty-five cents).
The first collegiate football game held at the stadium occurred on 1 November 1936, in which La Salle defeated fellow Christian Brothers' college (St. Mary's of Minnesota), 47-12. The stadium was officially dedicated on 10 October 1937 with a parade consisting of a color guard, the college band, and the college ROTC unit. The stadium was just five years old when La Salle's last Varsity football game was played in November 1941. The sport was suspended indefinitely because World War II resulted in a dramatic decline in the enrollment of La Salle and virtually every Catholic men's college. La Salle's aggregate record during eleven years of gridiron competition (1931–1941) was 51-34-8, and several Explorers had been named to Little All-American status.
The stadium continued to host high school football games, especially those involving La Salle College High School on Sunday afternoons, and recent LSCHS-Saint Joseph's Preparatory School Thanksgiving showdowns. During the Second World War, thirty or so German prisoners-of-war (housed in the nearby Pennsylvania National Guard Armory) were also periodically brought to the stadium for exercise, usually soccer.
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