Submitted photo
Drew Yoder, of Belleville, has an office like no other — the playing surface at Beaver Stadium. Yoder has been a full-time member of the grounds crew at Penn State since 2018.

BELLEVILLE — Drew Yoder is doing what he was born to do. He takes care of ballfields.

You can tell that was Yoder’s calling by the way he talks about turf and sod and how each is maintained, and you can tell it by the pristine surfaces he created and kept at Beaver Stadium and other athletic fields at Penn State over almost five years.

But his love for his job as an athletic fields groundskeeper at Penn State manifested itself so plainly surprised even Yoder.

“The first time I walked through the tunnel at Beaver Stadium, I remember it gave me goosebumps,” said the 32-year-old Yoder, of Belleville. “I thought how crazy it was that I got to work here. Today, we’re here at Beaver Stadium painting the field and it’s just another day of work now.”

Yoder has worked as a full-time groundskeeper at Penn State since 2018. He is part of an operations crew that maintains all the athletic fields except Medlar Field at Lubrano Park, the baseball stadium where the Nittany Lions play, along with the State College Spikes, a college summer baseball team of the MLB Draft League.

Penn State’s list of grass game fields includes football, softball, soccer, intramural fields and grass practice fields for football and soccer as well as artificial surfaces for field hockey, lacrosse, indoor turf field at Holuba Hall and a turf football practice field.

A 2008 graduate of Lewistown Area High School, Yoder majored in turf grass science at Penn State. He stumbled into his field — no pun intended — during a tour of the University Park campus.

“I had some extra time at the end of the day, and there was a bus taking anyone to the Valentine Research Center,” Yoder recalled. “I hopped on for free to check it out and decided that’s what I want to go to school for.

“Seeing the grass over there and how it was mowed to an eighth of an inch — it was just like carpet,” he added. “That got me interested.”

A friend of a friend helped him land a job on the grounds crew as he worked off and on for them while in college. He also served as an assistant groundskeeper for the Spikes from 2012-14.

While he studied turf grass science in the classroom, most of his skills were learned through on-the-job training.

The football game-day crew consists of nine full-time, year-round groundskeepers, two supervisors and countless students who work throughout the year.

“We have turf grass science students who work for us,” Yoder said. “But we take what we can get. We manage 200-plus acres of grass through the summer and whenever the grass is growing. There are no special skill requirements. We have landscaping majors and business majors, too.”

Landing a full-time gig on the grounds crew is a privilege for Yoder, who lives in Belleville with his wife, Kristen, and four children, Brigham, 9; Beckett, 6; Gibson, 4; and Ophelia, 1.

“Coming out of school, I didn’t know where I was going to end up,” he said. “Usually, guys in this field move many states away. It worked out and I was able to get full-time. I’m married and we have a kid (only Brigham at the time), so I’m close to home. It’s definitely a great spot to be in.”

During the football season, the grounds crew follows a strict schedule to prepare storied Beaver Stadium each week for gameday.

On Sundays, the crew make any necessary repairs to the field, walking back and forth every five yards to fill in holes.

“We look for any places where the grass got sheared off during play,” he explained.

If they find any spots where there is extensive damage, a plug — a 5-inch-wide and 3-inch-deep filler — might be needed from the sod nursery, which grows replacement grass for repairs.

The grass is also mowed in different ways to create the striped appearance.

“Notice how there are light and dark stripes, that’s done with rollers on the mower that push the grass the direction you are moving,” Yoder said. “It’s technically the same grass, it’s just the way the sun shines on it.

“The lighter stripes are when the mower is going away from you, and the dark is when it’s coming toward you,” he added.

On Thursdays and Fridays, the crew paints the markings on the field — the lines, hash marks, yard numbers and end zones. The first day everything in white is painted, while the second day blue is added around the numbers and end zone.

“We have a giant plastic stencil we use for the end zones and Big Ten logo, but that’s only used when we first lay the field out before the season,” Yoder said. “We continue to repaint them, so they don’t fade away.

“We use individual metal stencils for the numbers, and they get re-stenciled about three times a season,” he added.

Some college football fields have more intricate designs with logos in the middle of the field, like LSU, with a huge tiger eye, or Florida, with its mascot gator. Much like their football team’s uniforms, Beaver Stadium’s field is plain.

“We’re lucky Penn State keeps it very simple,” he joked. “There are no logos on the mid-field or no sponsorship logos. Some stadiums even have a white border around the entire field.”

On game days, the crew comes to the stadium early to set up benches and mats for the teams on each sideline. Once the game starts, they can enjoy the fruits of their labor as well as kickoff.

“We don’t have a lot to do, so we stand on the sideline and watch the game,” Yoder said. “Unless a big chunk of turf blows out and we have to go out and fix it. That doesn’t happen too often.”

Once the game ends, the crew starts to prepare the field at Beaver Stadium for the next game.