Nan Bernstein, the show's producer, declined to reveal the plot twist. But in a pre-shoot, locker-room meeting, Tim Crowley, a Division I college football referee and a technical adviser to the show, detailed for Capriotti and the players what's expected to happen and even mixed in a nice visual.
The players loved it. Without prompting, they immediately began pounding their thigh pads in rhythmic appreciation.
Earlier in the day, shooting was done at Temple University, which will be known as Braemore in the episode. Frankford is Pemberton, and the players wore green-and-white practice shirts. The locker-room doors were repainted green, as was the scoreboard, though Pioneers was retained as the nickname.
The green helmets were borrowed from Ridley High, and stickers featuring a "P" were slapped over the "R's."
Bernstein said she asked a friend to scout six locations in the Philly area and that the contenders were whittled to two.
"We didn't want a tricked-out stadium with turf," she said. "We didn't want a place we could have found anywhere in Texas. We wanted something older. Something with a great feel. This place spoke to us."
Only two official cast members were part of the shoot. One was Eric Taylor, played by Kyle Chandler, head coach of the show's East Dillon High Lions.
As the crew set up equipment, Chandler, sporting a Braemore hat, sunglasses and cowboy boots, stood outside the stadium's Dyre Street (north) entrance and took photos of the developing scene inside the stadium.
"This is hallowed ground," he said. "Just a beautiful little space."
Capriotti said he and Jack Creighton, Frankford's athletic director, encountered a man checking out the stadium one afternoon late last spring.
