Colorado State University has received a gift commitment of $20 million over 30 years to transfer the “Sonny Lubick Field” designation from Hughes Stadium to the new on-campus stadium scheduled to open for the 2017 football season.

While seeking to honor Lubick, the Rams’ coach from the 1993 through 2007 seasons, by carrying over the playing field name, the donors asked the university not to publicly identify them.

CSU athletic director Joe Parker said the university will continue to seek a separate naming rights deal for the stadium.

The Lubick Field contribution is especially eye-opening because the annual average of $666,666 is within the parameters CSU is seeking for the actual stadium naming rights — and the anonymous gift is for a longer term than a naming rights agreement is expected to be.

Lubick, 79, still lives in Fort Collins and is a spokesman for Public Service Credit Union, and is director of community outreach and also helps teach a leadership class for CSU’s business school.

“I’m flattered,” he said of the contribution. “I certainly didn’t expect this. I try to keep my ear to the ground about how things are going with the new stadium and everything. Knowing the way things work, bottom line, I didn’t expect them to carry my name over, to be honest, because there were so many options for them, I’m sure.”

While repeatedly using the term “they” to describe the contributors of the $20 million, Parker declined to be more specific about those involved in the formal gift document.

“If I provide any information that narrows the focus, that’s not really following the intent of their desire to remain anonymous,” Parker said. “They understood that with the move back to campus, the field naming at Hughes wasn’t necessarily a guarantee that we as a university would be in position to continue to honor Sonny in that way, just because of the financial realities of the project and that being an attractive opportunity for us to solicit a donation.

“They decided that they wanted to put that focus on Sonny and ensure that the recognition would exist at the on-campus stadium. I thought it was a tremendous act of understanding the community and the legacy Sonny has created not only in football, but as a campus leader.”

CSU president Tony Frank noted: “It’s an amazingly generous gift. I think the first thing I said was, ‘Repeat that number?'”

Frank laughed, then continued.

“I think it’s a testimony to how many people in the community, and I think this donor is no exception, have seen what Sonny has brought to the table,” he said.

Parker said of the $20-million donors: “Even though their commitment probably could have put them in position to even name the stadium, they wanted to leave that as an open opportunity for us. They wanted us to be able to continue to seek a partnership that would offer an additional revenue stream for the project. That’s either through naming rights or an outright contribution to name the stadium.”

Parker said the commitment for naming rights would be “at least a $500,000 annual commitment for probably 10 years. We think we have the possibility to find a corporate partner that might go more than that. I think the upper bound would be $1 million, so somewhere between that $500,000 and $1 million (annually) would be the logical space for us for stadium naming.”

The $220 million stadium project, Parker said, is on schedule and on track to be on budget. He said CSU has received deposits and commitments for 70 percent of the premium seating, already close to the target under the stadium finance plan approved by the CSU system’s board of governors. “We’re filling all the buckets that need to be filled,” Parker said.

The original Sonny Lubick Field designation began in 2000, when Albert Yates was university president and the financial backer was Pat Stryker of Stryker Corporation, a medical technology company, also active since 2001 with her philanthropic Bohemian Foundation.

“When you’re in the middle of the job and working, and you have that honor bestowed with Dr. Yates and Pat Stryker, you don’t even think of it too much at the time because you’re always forging ahead to the next season,” Lubick said. “Now that I’ve been out of coaching, it really makes a big difference. It’s really gratifying, and I’m thankful to Dr. Yates and everybody else.

“I know every coach says this, but this is a direct reflection on the coaches and on the players that I was privileged and proud to coach. I guess my name goes on it, but I carry the banner for them.”

Frank said Lubick “really redefined the trajectory of CSU athletics.” He added, “We’ve tried to say very strongly that we expect to excel in anything we do. And I think if Sonny had not done what he’d done in the period where he was the head coach here, the argument that we can expect to excel in athletics … I think would have been a lot lower without him blazing that trail for us and saying, you know what, a place like Colorado State actually should expect to be competitive and to perform as well in athletics as we do in other areas.”

The contribution, Frank said, was a significant shot in the arm for the project, controversial in its planning stages.

“We developed a financial model, I believe, with a very good set of buffers to protect any impact on tuition of state funding,” Frank said. “I’m very comfortable with that model, but the better any aspect of the financial model performs, the safer things are, the less chance we’ll even use the buffers that we put in place.

“One of the key aspects of the financial model is the naming rights. Having exceeded the stadium and naming rights (goal) with this gift, it takes the pressure off us in terms of selling the stadium naming rights. If we can still deliver on that, it takes even more pressure off the rest of the financial model. That’s one of those areas where I’d really love to run up the score and give ourselves as big of a buffer as possible.”

Terry Frei: tfrei@denverpost.com or @TFrei