since outgrown Hayward Field, which was one of the smallest stadiums in the University Division (forerunner of Division I). Only 9,000 tickets were available to the general public. While nearly every seat was protected from the elements, it had little else going for it. It was in such poor condition that coaches deliberately steered prospective recruits away from it on their visits to Eugene. As a result, outside of the Civil War game with Oregon State, the Ducks played their higher-attended home games (in practice, nearly all of their conference games) at Portland's Multnomah Stadium, away. Athletic director Leo Harris chafed at making the Ducks make the two-hour trip to Portland three times a year, and pressed for a new stadium on land just north of campus. School president Arthur Flemming was initially skeptical of the project, and asked Skidmore, Owings & Merrill to evaluate whether it was feasible to build the stadium on the northern site, expand Hayward Field to up to 40,000 seats (believed to be the minimum capacity for moving the entire home slate to Eugene), or build a new stadium on Hayward Field's footprint. The study definitively ruled out Hayward Field as the site for a new or renovated football stadium. SOM believed that city officials would never sign off on expanding Hayward Field since it hadn't been built to code, and there was no room to build a new stadium on Hayward's footprint. As a result, Hayward Field's final varsity football game was played in 1966, a one-point loss to Washington State on Its replacement, Autzen Stadium, opened in September 1967, and Hayward Field became a facility solely for track and field, except for a few freshman team football games. Track widening The track was widened to eight lanes late in the summer of 1969 and converted to an all-weather surface that autumn. Its first synthetic track was Pro-Turf, a urethane and sand composite which led to a hard and fast surface; it produced many world records and gained a reputation as the world's fastest track. Light in color, it was resurfaced with the same in 1976. Western grandstand Decayed and in disrepair, the original west grandstand was built in 1925 and its roof added demolished in and the finish line (for most events) was moved to the track's northeast corner for the 1974 season. The new west grandstand, also made of wood with a