The Castle High School Marching Knights had one major obstacle at the state competition this year -- the unknown.

The band performed in the newly-built Lucas Oil Stadium in Indianapolis, which replaces the RCA Dome that will be imploded in December.

So, all the known factors -- the "dead spots," the astroturf and the strange sound reverberations -- meant nothing.

"ISSMA (Indiana State School of Music Association) did a great job of putting on a good show in the new stadium," said Faril Bunner, Assistant Director of Bands for Castle. "They had their own set of challenges. They had no idea what it was going to be like once they got all these bands in the parking lot and into the stadium and they did a very good job handling that. The show ran a little late, but that's just due to a new facility and a new way of having to do things."

The Knights marched into ninth place out of 10 bands in Class A.

Lawrence Central took home first place and Castle's marching rival, Ben Davis, finished 10th.

"The performance went fairly well," Bunner said. "This was our first time in the big, new stadium and it was a very different environment. No one had ever performed in that setting before. The students were, I think, a little bit nervous about getting to perform in the stadium. It was an absolutely gorgeous stadium to perform in. Lots and lots of new experiences and what-not went along with this weekend."

In addition to the new stadium, the Knights also faced a new format of getting to state. Previously, geographically-close bands competed against each other. Beginning this year, a semi-state competition was added, which had 20 Class A marching bands from across the state battle it out for 10 spots in the state contest

The Marching Knights will compete for the final time this season on Saturday. The band will journey back to Lucas Oil Stadium in Indianapolis for the Bands of America competition.

The contest will have 35 bands performing in the preliminary morning session, with 10 moving on to the finals that evening. Castle is slated to perform at 10:45 a.m.

"It will be a very long day, but it can be a very rewarding day for the students," Bunner said.

The Bands of America event has been fairly good to Castle in the past -- the Knights finished fifth there in 2006 -- but Bunner is making no predictions about this year.

"There's a great, great, great group of bands that show up to this regional," he said. "So, it's very difficult to predict where we're going to be within that group."