ND AD: No safety concerns about playing field

Published Nov. 21, 2010 12:21 a.m. ET

foxsports

Notre Dame athletic director Jack Swarbrick says there were no concerns about the safety of the playing field at Yankee Stadium for the game between the Fighting Irish and Army.

Northwestern and Illinois were playing at Wrigley Field on Saturday and the teams had to play all offensive snaps toward one end zone because the outfield wall was too close to the back of one end zone.

The end zone in the outfield at Yankee Stadium is a few feet away from the wall in the corners, but otherwise it's not much different from most football stadiums.

Swarbrick and Army AD Col. Tom Johnson spoke at a pregame news conference.

''The colonel and I got to together before the game and decided to play the full field,'' Swarbrick said with a laugh.

The Yankees brought in Notre Dame officials and staked out the logistics for the field months ago. Having a chance to see how the field would lay out in person helped allay on concerns about safety, Swarbrick said.

One goal post sit right around where home plate would usually be and the other is just a few yards to the left of the 408-foot sign on the wall in dead center field.

The game was sold out with additional bleacher seats added in the outfield.

College football at Yankee Stadium is going to become a routine event. The Pinstripe Bowl will be played Dec. 30 for the first time, matching teams from the Big East and Big 12.

Yankees president Randy Levine said more than 29,000 tickets have already been sold for the bowl game.

Army has three regular-season games scheduled at Yankee Stadium over the next four seasons and the Yankees would like to have at least one regular-season college football games per year at the House that Ruth Built.