UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — When the Pittsburgh Steelers and Seattle Seahawks took to the field for Super Bowl XL, they’ were counting on the unique contributions of recent graduates of Penn State’s College of Agricultural Sciences. And, while they weren’t blocking or tackling, these Penn Staters have important roles for both teams.

Graduates of the college’s turfgrass science and turf management programs are the head groundskeeper for the Seahawks, and are three of the grounds crew for the Steelers’ Heinz Field. A Penn Stater is also on the National Football League’s Super Bowl Turf Team, responsible for the playing surfaces for the game and for each team’s practice facility.

According to Andy McNitt, assistant professor of turfgrass science, having so many Penn Staters in on the Super Bowl action isn’t unusual: as home to one of the country’s top turf science and management programs, the university has alumni working with numerous professional football and baseball franchises, including the Philadelphia Eagles, Baltimore Ravens, Detroit Tigers and Milwaukee Brewers.

Penn State turfgrass program grads occupy some of the most prestigious jobs in the turfgrass industry, including positions as superintendents at 15 (including the top four) of Golf Digest’s top 25 U.S. golf courses. Penn State is an acknowledged world leader in the development of improved turfgrass varieties and other products, and Penn State–bred turfgrass varieties are used on 90 percent of all golf courses around the world. In recent years, the university has applied its turf expertise to more rugged sports.

“Traditionally, we’ve been very golf-oriented, but lots of things are applicable across the board,” McNitt says. “An insect is an insect, whether he’s chewing on golf turf or sports turf. A disease is a disease, fertilizers is fertilizer. But there’s a management aspect that comes in: soil physical properties are very important in football and, to some degree, baseball. The physics of how a divot comes out and how the soil drains are critical in athletic field management.”

While the soil and grass are the same, there’s a profound difference between the pressures of a 30-foot putt and a 320-pound lineman—or even high school football and the Super Bowl.

“The players are bigger and faster, and it’s a matter of mass times velocity,” McNitt says. “The cuts that they make at high speed can just rip a field up. So we see a lot of difference between college and the professional level in terms of what they do to the field.”

Penn State is producing more graduates who want to combine their love of sports and the outdoors in their professional careers, and pro teams are happy to have groundskeepers with rigorous education and training.

“We’re certainly not dominating—yet—but we have a lot of assistants moving up in pro sports organizations, and more are becoming head groundskeepers,” he says. “There aren’t that many jobs with pro teams, but college and universities are always looking for turfgrass managers, and communities installing parks and athletic fields need someone who knows how to take care of them.”

McNitt explains that the Super Bowl Turf Team always oversees installation of new artificial turf for the big game, to ensure that the championship game isn’t played on a substandard field, worn down by a 16-game season.

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Writer-Editor: Gary Abdullah office 814-863-2708 home 814-237-1023 e-mail gxa2@psu.edu