{"id":173064,"date":"2023-11-27T13:59:16","date_gmt":"2023-11-27T18:59:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/?p=173064"},"modified":"2023-11-27T13:59:18","modified_gmt":"2023-11-27T18:59:18","slug":"football-title-games-staying-in-canton","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/2023\/11\/27\/football-title-games-staying-in-canton\/","title":{"rendered":"Football title games staying in Canton"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p><em>Submitted information<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>COLUMBUS &#8212; The Ohio High School Athletic Association and the Pro Football Hall of Fame have announced a new three-year contract that will keep the OHSAA football state championships in Canton at Tom Benson Hall of Fame Stadium through 2026. The agreement includes two option years. The current three-year contract is set to expire after this week\u2019s state finals.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>OHSAA Executive Director Doug Ute made the announcement Monday in Canton at the Hall of Fame Luncheon Club. Ute was in Canton to speak to the members as part of his annual visit with the group on Monday of state championships week.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\"><figure class=\"alignright size-full\"><img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"350\" height=\"257\" src=\"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2023\/11\/Tom-Benson-Hall-of-Fame-Stadium-2023-e1701111465158.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-173065\"\/><figcaption>Tom Benson Hall of Fame Stadium will host state championship games through 2026. <em>Visit Canton photo<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cWe are excited to continue to grow this partnership with the Pro Football Hall of Fame,\u201d Ute said. \u201cThey have been so good to work with and are just as excited as us to take the next steps with the finals in Canton and have people experience all that the Hall of Fame, the surrounding Hall of Fame Village, and Canton have to offer in addition to state championship football. We also thank Visit Canton for their support of the state championships and appreciate their support to host the games in Stark County.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cThe Pro Football Hall of Fame is proud to partner with Visit Canton and the OHSAA to keep the seven state championship games in Canton for the next three years,\u201d said Jim Porter, Hall of Fame president. \u201cThe Hall wants this relationship to continue long into the future. Our staff will look for additional ways to build the weekend into a full community celebration \u2013 making the experience even more special for the teams playing in Canton and creating memories that will last a lifetime.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>After Ohio Stadium in Columbus hosted the state championships throughout the 1980s, the finals moved to Massillon and Canton in Stark County from 1990 through 2013. The finals moved back to The Ohio State University from 2014-16, which was also when Fawcett Stadium in Canton was torn down and Tom Benson Hall of Fame Stadium was built, which has hosted the state finals since 2017 except in 2020 due to the pandemic, when the finals were hosted in Massillon.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cVisit Canton is delighted that the OHSAA has selected Stark County to continue as host of its state high school football championship games. Without question, this event has become a cornerstone for our community for several decades,\u201d said Allyson Bussey, president and CEO of Visit Canton. \u201cWe continue our commitment to support this longstanding partnership with the OHSAA and Pro Football Hall of Fame and look forward to welcoming the teams, coaches and fans to Canton.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>All seven 2023 state championship games will be played in Canton this Thursday through Saturday.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Submitted information COLUMBUS &#8212; The Ohio High School Athletic Association and the Pro Football Hall of Fame have announced a new three-year contract that will keep the OHSAA football state championships in Canton at Tom Benson Hall of Fame Stadium through 2026. The agreement includes two option years. The current three-year contract is set to [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-173064","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-sports"],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-05-10 13:29:12","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/173064","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=173064"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/173064\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":173066,"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/173064\/revisions\/173066"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=173064"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=173064"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thevwindependent.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=173064"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}