Video boards have become big recruiting tool

Used to be, college recruiters slapped a kid's name on a jersey — and he could almost see himself there.

The NCAA won't let you do that anymore. But schools will do whatever it takes to make a good impression. And more and more, they're using the latest technology to do it.

Scoring the boards

These days, it seems the board is almost as important as the score. Oklahoma's new scoreboard and big-screen video display will be state-of-the-art, but it won't be the biggest around.

Godzillatron

University of Texas,

Austin

•Built: 2005

•Cost: $8 million

•Dimensions: 134 feet wide by 55 feet tall

•What's on it: Approximately 50 percent of the screen is used for advertising, with a small strip at the bottom for typical scoreboard features (time, score, down and distance, etc.).

Pig Screen TV

University of Arkansas,

Fayetteville

•Built: 2000

•Cost: $3.75 million

•Dimensions: 107 feet wide by 30 feet tall

•What's on it: Strictly game video. One-fourth of the screen displays an advertisement during replays. Other scoreboard features are displayed on 30-foot-by-30-foot boards flanking the video screen.

12th Man TV

Texas A&M,

College Station

• Built: 2006

•Cost: $5 million

•Dimensions: 74 feet wide by 54 feet tall

•What's on it: Game footage and scoreboard information. Advertising appears during down time in games.

By Scott Wright

Welcome, Oklahomans, to the newest — or at least, the largest — tactical weapon in college football's ever-escalating arms race: the bigger, better scoreboard.

Actually, this race started some time ago. A couple years back, Texas athletic director DeLoss Dodds traveled to the Ozarks with his football team. The Longhorns hadn't been to Fayetteville since the Hogs bolted for the SEC.

Things had changed.

Where Razorback Stadium once had been an erector set, it had morphed into something spectacular. But what drew Dodds' eye was the mammoth video board.

Thirty feet high, 107 feet long. All computerized, with a picture so sharp and clear, it was like the ultimate flat screen in the Man Room of your dreams.

They called it Pig Screen TV. When it debuted in 2000, it was billed as the biggest video board in the world.

Dodds wanted one of his own. And he got one. Because as Dodds is fond of saying, Texas doesn't keep up with the Joneses. Texas is the Joneses.

Fifty-five feet tall, 134 feet long. All digital, with a picture so sharp and clear, it made Arkansas' look like a 19-inch model.

They called it Godzillatron. When it debuted last summer, it was billed as the biggest video board in the world.

Godzillatron looms so large, you half-expect Mothra to fly in and meet her death. Seriously, some worried the scoreboard might distract southbound traffic on nearby I-35.

Yeah, it's that big.

So today, OU's Board of Regents will vote to approve $10.3 million worth of new and improved scoreboards to Owen Field and Lloyd Noble Center. Almost half will go toward a new south end-zone scoreboard.

It won't be as large as Godzillatron, which cost $8 million all by its lonestarsome. But it will be plenty big, something like the size of the Pig Screen TV.

And it'll have the newest and best technology available.

In Stillwater, they're planning four smaller (but not small) boards with the same technology.

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