Steelers Now
Earlier this month, Precision Turf shared on X they have finished installing the new playing surface at Acrisure Stadium.
Steelers president Art Rooney II confirmed at the NFL Owners Meetings that the team was in the process of replacing Acrisure Stadium’s playing surface. The Steelers’ grass playing surface came under fire again in the 2025 season, with kicker Chris Boswell slipping and missing a field goal and special teams captain Miles Killebrew suffered a season-ending knee injury, which some teammates attributed to the turf.
“Honestly, it was shit,” fellow captain Cam Heyward said. “I lost one of my teammates and that makes me sad about it. … I like grass, but that wasn’t grass we played on.”
Steelers quarterback Aaron Rodgers also ripped the field conditions in the aftermath of the Week 6 game against the Cleveland Browns, calling it “borderline unplayable.”
The field was so bad last year that the Steelers received an F- grade for their home playing surface in the 2026 NFLPA report card, ranking last in the league.
Former Steelers outside linebacker James Harrison weighed in on the new playing surface. He doesn’t think anything will change due to the Steelers sharing the field with Pitt. The WPIAL championship games are played at Acrisure Stadium in November, as well.
The Steelers and Pitt have shared Acrisure Stadium since its opening in 2001. Likewise for the WPIAL having its championship games played at the venue every November.
“The biggest issue that we have is that it’s too many games played on that surface,” Harrison said recently on his Deebo & Joe podcast. “I don’t care how many times you change the surface. It’s not gonna work. It’s gonna get terrible in that stadium because you have Pitt playing on that surface, you have us playing on that surface, and then you have the high school playoff games playing on that surface in November.
“When you look at it, you’ve got 25 games or more that are playing on that surface, and that’s before we even get to the playoffs… Until the Steelers have their own stadium that only they play in, this will be a problem. It will continue to be a problem.”
The Steelers will use Tahoma 31 Bermudagrass instead of the Kentucky bluegrass they had used.
“The fields actually will be planted at a sod farm,” Rooney said. “So, we won’t get the new field until sometime in August. But as we’ve talked about, it’ll be a new surface, a new kind of grass mixture. And look forward to seeing how it works.”
That new blend of grass is already being used at Lincoln Financial Field in Philadelphia and at Soldier Field in Chicago and is expected to help the Steelers and Acrisure Stadium get up to par with the new NFL standards. J
Just like the Steelers situation with Pitt playing their homes games at Acrisure Stadium, Temple University also plays at the Eagles’ Lincoln Financial Field.
This article originally appeared on Steelers Now:...
