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Report: Heinz Field To Be Renamed Acrisure Stadium

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The Pitt Panthers have played their last game at Heinz Field.

Pitt football home games will still be played on the North Shore but the building they play in will have a different name.

93.7 FM’s Andrew Fillipponi is reporting that the new name of the stadium will be Acrisure Stadium, which is a brokerage firm based out of Michigan. Terms of the deal have not been reported.

Acrisure is a Michigan-based insurance broker worth $23 billion and was founded in 2005 and led by CEO Greg Williams.

Acrisure purchased Pittsburgh-based Tulco LLC’s artificial intelligence business in 2020. Tulco is owned by billionaire and Pittsburgh native Thomas Tull, who is also part owner of the Pittsburgh Steelers.

Fillipponi reports that this news could become official as early as Tuesday.

The Heinz Company, the world-famous ketchup brand and perhaps Pittsburgh’s most notable brand, has owned the naming rights to Heinz Field since even before the opening of the stadium.

The original 20-year, $57 million naming rights deal (an homage of Heinz 57, of course) was extended as the deal came to an end in 2021, but the two sides were apparently unable to come together to strike a deal this time around.

Perhaps the very first official stadium that Pitt can claim is Exposition Park, on the North Shore where Heinz Field and PNC Park now stand, from 1904-08, while still under the name of Western University of Pennsylvania.

Pitt began playing at old Forbes Field in 1909, but after 15 years of sharing the park with the Pittsburgh Pirates, Pitt moved to the newly built Pitt Stadium in Oakland.

Pitt spent 74 years playing at Pitt Stadium, from 1925 through 1999, and in those 74 years, Pitt won six national championships, claimed a Heisman winner (the great Tony Dorsett) and established a name brand across college football.

A one year stay at Three Rivers Stadium in 2000, a 7-5 season with wins over Penn State and West Virginia, gave way to the past 21 years at Heinz Field.

While it wasn’t always easy sailing, Pitt went 153-113 throughout a run as a member of the Big East (2001-12) and the ACC (2013-21). The 2021 season saw the emergence of Kenny Pickett as a Heisman finalist and Pitt’s first ACC championship in program history.

 

Sandy Schall, Coldwell Banker
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Justin Dietrich
Justin Dietrich
1 year ago

What a joke

Bill in Holly Springs
Bill in Holly Springs
1 year ago

Now Pitt REALLY needs their own stadium!

PittBand
PittBand
1 year ago

As I understood from a recent conversation with former Allegheny Commissioner Mike DeWida, naming rights went to the public entity responsible for upkeep of the stadium and not Art Rooney Junior’s grubby little hands. Article seems to infer otherwise.

DeWida was the lead county commissioner when the stadium was built. He promised that tax payers would not foot one cent of the building of the stadium.That $80 million went a long way toward keeping that promise.

Last edited 1 year ago by PittBand

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