Delaware State gets $20 million boost in athletic facility funding

By Chris Stevens

Delaware State’s Athletics Transformation Project received a significant boost by passing the 2025-26 fiscal year state budget.

The university received $20 million for a multipurpose field house to help the football team and other athletic programs recruit battles against schools with more modern facilities.

“It’s going to inject a lot of energy and goodwill into our campus,” Delaware State athletic director Tony Tucker told the Delaware News Journal. “We can’t wait to get started.”

New Hornets head football coach DeSean Jackson added, “Coming from a big school like Cal and seeing them transform over the years [through upgrades], I think it’s really gonna help with recruiting. Not having people overlook us and go to rival schools like Norfolk and Howard, who have eye-popping facilities, will be huge.”

An added bonus for DSU was a section of Delaware’s bond bill where the state’s joint finance committee expressed “the desire to work towards exploring options for funding” a new convocation center.

The $90-million facility would replace 43-year-old Memorial Hall, which ranks 347th out of 363 NCAA D1 programs with a capacity of 1,800.