Overview
- The Sept. 5 game vs. South Dakota State and Sept. 19 game vs. Colorado will be played at Northwestern Medicine Field at Martin Stadium on the lakefront.
- FOX will televise the Friday night Big Ten home opener on Oct. 2, after which the remaining five home games are slated for the new venue.
- Builders project physical completion in mid‑September, and the university plans a soft open to test operations and conduct team practices before the first game.
- The project carries a final reported cost of $862 million, is largely funded by the Ryan family, and reconfigures capacity to 35,000—about 12,000 fewer seats than the previous stadium.
- Organizers cited stormwater permitting delays, an extended approval process and severe winter weather for schedule impacts; the opening falls 100 years to the day after the site’s original stadium debuted.