The Buffaloes have spent most of this season on the road.

But that ends Friday as Manteca High will return to the newly renovated Guss Schmiedt Field in a pivotal Valley Oak League finale against Oakdale.

The Buffaloes (5-0 VOL, 8-1) will need to fend off the second-place Mustangs (4-1, 6-3) to clinch the crown.

But it’s the return to the home turf that especially thrilling to the MHS fans and families.

The 65-year-old facility just got new lights, playing surface, visitors’ bleachers, all-weather track, and a state-of-the-art scoreboard.

“We are excited,” said Principal Megan Peterson.

She announced there will be an open house/soft opening today of the stadium, from 4 to 5 p.m.

“Just in time for people to come by and get a look before game day,” Peterson said.

No special plans are in store for the Mustangs-Buffaloes game other than Senior Night coupled with added support from the Baby Buffs cheer teams.

A ribbon-cutting ceremony is planned for Nov. 15, which will be held before a playoff game, according to Peterson.

 Before Guss Schmiedt Field was dedicated on Monday, September 21, 1959, football was played on Pennebaker Field where the varsity softball diamond sat on the southwestern end of campus before being removed to build the new big gym.

 “It was like a cow field,” said Mike Erdman during a 2009 interview of Pennebaker Field during the 50th anniversary ceremonies for the storied Manteca High field.

Erdman was a part of the 1960 team that won the Valley Oak League championship and went undefeated at home in the second year of Guss Schmiedt Field under head coach Phil Harmon.

“The (Pennebaker Field) bleachers were all made out of wood and falling apart. You could sit on it, but you’d get splinters,” Erdman said.

 The difference was monumental to Erdman’s fellow 1961 graduate Joel Linker.

“It was like going from the Little Leagues to the big leagues,” Linker said back in 2009 of Guss Schmiedt Field. “The old field had a track around it, but it wasn’t much. I wasn’t impressed with it at all, but this was impressive.”

Manteca was victorious, 14-6, against hated rival Tracy High at its new home in 1959. Brumley scored the first touchdown at the stadium with a 6-yard quarterback keeper.

Guss Schmiedt was a member of the original Board of Trustees and was elected president in 1937.

The 10-year process of the stadium’s birth began in 1949 when the board secured property east of Garfield Ave. for future expansion.

The stadium sat 2,400 and expanded to 3,640 after it was renovated in 1996.

 Schmiedt was among the early boosters of a high school. Up until 1920, anyone who wanted to attend high school from the South County had to travel to Stockton.

The creation of a high school district encompassing the communities of Manteca, Lathrop and French Camp had been discussed for 20 years but was abandoned repeatedly because critics contended the cost would be too high.

Even when the community finally was getting ready to pursue an election, an intense debate broke out whether the high school should be located in Lathrop – which was larger at the time – or in Manteca. Efforts to agree on a more central location failed.

Finally on May 19, 1920 an election took place to create the district. Nineteen men of the community borrowed enough money on their own to construct temporary wooden buildings on the site that now houses Manteca High.

The first board election was conducted in 1920. Among those securing seats was Schmiedt, Eva Patterson, Ed Powers, L.L. Miller, and P.L. Wisdom.

The new school – designed in classic California mission style – was dedicated on Dec. 23, 1921. The first graduating class of 1923 consisted of 10 students.

The first football field 80 years ago was created by farmers using tractors led by Schmiedt

The original dedication program for Guss Schmiedt Field noted Schmiedt had served since 1937 as board president.

In his first four decades of board service, Schmiedt attended about 1,100 school board meetings and traveled “over 14,000 miles in attending these meetings — all at no expense to the district” according to the program.