Arenas

Cheerleader of the Day: Washington Wizards #2

Shawn Siegel — Thu, 03 Jul 2008 15:39:55 -0400

Cheerleader of the Day

Thanks to our friends over at Icon Sports Media, we have access to thousands of great college & NBA basketball photos to use on the site. Each day, along with our Picture of the Day, we'll be featuring a Cheerleader of the Day. In honor of the upcoming NBA Draft, we'll be focusing on NBA dancers until the end of June!

Miami Heat

- Check out past Cheerleaders of the Day!

- Also check out the Picture of the Day!

New home for Seton Hall basketball

Raphielle Johnson — Thu, 10 May 2007 14:00:44 -0400

According to today's Newark Star-Ledger, Seton Hall has reached agreement with the new Prudential Center in Newark, meaning that their 26-year run of playing at the Continental Airlines Arena will come to an end. While negotiations have not been finalized, the New Jersey Devils (primary tenants of the new arena) and Seton Hall have found common ground in areas such as weekend scheduling, a major sticking point early in the negotiation process. With the Devils moving to Newark for the 2007-08 season, and the Nets moving to Brooklyn in 2009, the New Jersey Sports and Exposition Authority finds itself in a very tough spot when it comes to the Meadowlands Sports Complex. The Prudential Center is four miles away from Seton Hall's main campus in South Orange, and three blocks from the law school in Newark. In order to attend home games at CAA, some students had to take school-provided school buses to the arena. In 1998-99, I was one of those kids. So while Seton Hall has had some great moments at the Meadowlands, such as their win over Georgetown back in 1989, this move could do wonders for attendance and the growth of the program. http://www.nj.com/setonhall/ledger/index.ssf?/base/sports-0/117877265713250.xml&coll=1&thispage=2

Night in the MEAC: a Cigarboy Road Trip

Bill Kintner — Sat, 10 Feb 2007 11:09:45 -0500

GREENSBORO, NC – What’s a MEAC you may ask? It stands for the Mid-Eastern Atlantic Conference.

It is a conference of historic Black schools. They are only ranked 31st in the RPI, but don’t tell the fans tonight at North Carolina A&T University, to them the home team Aggies are the NBA Champion 1993 Chicago Bulls. And little Steven Rush who tonight scored 28 points, is their Michael Jordan.

Well tonight’s tale takes place at the 5700 seat Corbett Sports Center, a very unremarkable basketball venue built in 1978.

But just because the building is unremarkable, doesn’t mean what happens in the building is unremarkable. In fact, this building has been host to a ton of good basketball.

For starters the Corbett Sports Center had an impressive 37 game winning streak from January 18, 1986 until November 30, 1988.

Around that time the Aggies appeared in the NCAA Tournament seven straight times from 1981 through 1987. They even made a couple return appearances in 1994 and 1995. Since then winning seasons have been few and far between.

Coming into this game A&T was only 8-12 and the Hampton Pirates were just 7-12. But someone forgot to tell the 4105 fans who came to the Corbett Sports Center to see their beloved Aggies win.

The Aggies average over 4000 fans a game and that is far more than any other school in their conference.

Those fans include the students standing at each end just 2-3 feet from the court. It is very intimidating to have fans that close.

Twice during the game there was an announcement to stay off the court and out of play. But tonight the students are well behaved.

Music is front and center at this venue. When the action stops the very good pep band swings into action. If it is not the band, then they crank up the rap music or sometimes some jazzy R and B music.

But rest assured it will not be quiet.

Now let me add I am not a fan of rap music, but gosh darn it works at the Corbett Sports Center. Maybe it is because of all the fans dancing in front of their seats. The stands start to shake and sway as the dance competition gets going. There is never a dull moment when the action stops on the court.

The PA announcer is a fellow named John Allen. He has a great voice, and the ability to say just the right thing, at the right time, using a minimum of words to do it.

At just the right time he will say, “Are there any Aggies in the House?”

Of course, the fans get louder.

Allen must have been a fan of the old Gomer Pyle show because he did a great Sergeant Carter imitation when he said, “I can’t HEAR you!”

Then it gets even louder again.

At the beginning of the evening he reminded the fans that A&T’ Corbett Sports Center was chosen as the 14^th best atmosphere in college. He said it as a reminder to the fans to keep the noise level up.

Never mind that he was referring to a fan poll from ESPN.com where fans who never went to most of the venues presented in the poll to be voted on just voted for their favorite schools.

But that is not the point. The point is that A&T takes tremendous pride in their program and the atmosphere in the gym, plus that everyone there was having a great time.

As the crowd roared the Aggies came out and laid an egg. By the 9:22 mark in the first half they trailed by 19 points at 27-8.

But the crowd screamed, danced and sang along with the music and sure enough Lazarus came back from the dead as the Aggies closed the gap to as close as eight points with a minute left in the first half before allowing Hampton to push their led back up to double digits at 41-30 at half time.

The half time entertainment was the dance team. They danced to some rap songs and every eye in the place was on the girls, as they worked their way though their routine.

In the second half the Aggies chipped away at the Hampton lead and finally at the 11:09 mark they tied the game at 48-48 on a free throw by Jason

Wills.

During the time outs the music plays on.

During one second half time out, they cranked up the song “Atomic Dog” by George Clinton. All eyes went up to the upper section aisle where a fraternity did a fancy dance in unison, while a lot of the fans especially the students danced a little themselves.

By the 3:59 mark the Aggies pushed their lead up to five points at 62-57.

Another time out and the crowd is going nuts.

They played a song called Go Sit Down by Maceo and of course everyone stood up and danced. There was a fraternity dancing in a mob on the upper aisle and there was one shirtless guy on anther guy’s shoulders. As they were dancing the guys were all smacking the guy on the shoulders until he fell off. Of course, they caught him and everyone in the gym had a smile on their face.

Back on the court as the game starts fans are shouting, “defense, defense, defense,” but the game starts going south for A&T and they end up losing 70-64.

The fans go home after another loss, but they will be back again. After all this is North Carolina A&T and their games are among the most unique, interesting and fun games in all of college basketball.

Night in the Valley: a Cigarboy Road Trip

Bill Kintner — Fri, 09 Feb 2007 13:52:53 -0500

Cedar Falls, Iowa – It is about three degree outside, with a stiff wind blowing across the Iowa plains. People walk quickly and silently as they try to get inside to avoid the cold.

But in the brand-spanking new McLeod Center on the campus of Northern Iowa University it might as well be Miami Beach as the cheerful fans go crazy cheering on their beloved Panthers.

Tonight the opponent is their in-state rival the Drake Bulldogs. There are no easy conference games in The Valley. Drake is only 12-12 coming into the game, but they have beaten every Division I team in Iowa except Northern Iowa.

As the fans stream in and find their seat the UNI pep bands clad in purple and yellow stripe rugby shirts plays. Their up-beat music adds to the festive atmosphere.

The lighting in McLeod Center is bright giving the arena an open, airy and fun feel. As the huge student section located at one end of the court starts to fill up it becomes apparent that there will be close to 1000 students attending tonight’s game.

The McLeod Center opened this year. It took the place of the UNI-Dome located adjacent to the new arena. The Uni-Dome was an all-purpose dome that normally seated about 10,000 for basketball but at times it was expanded to seat over 20,000.

It was not a good venue for basketball.

So Northern Iowa decided to build a new arena and they set out to raise enough private money finance a 12,000 seat arena. As the money commitments started to trickle in they started to down size their dreams.

The final product is a 7018 seat pit-style arena. The design is similar to Iowa, Kansas State, Wright State, San Diego State and New Mexico.

This is a no-frills arena, but make no mistake about it, they got the essentials right and it is a nice place to see a basketball game.

When fans walk in they enter on a concourse above the seating bowl. They then descend down to their seats. The student end is bleacher seating, but almost all the other fans get seats.

At the end of the court opposite the student section the seats only go half way up and there is the Hall of Fame room that will be completed by next year and it offers a great view of the court.

There are some bleachers on the concourse above the Hall of Fame room.

Tonight the visiting Bulldogs maintain a small lead through most of the first half. The home team Panthers do get a brief five point lead four minutes into the game before Drake grabs a 28-22 lead at half time.

Northern Iowa runs probably as many promotions as any team I have seen.

There is the standard having kids dress up in a player’s uniform and shoot a basket. There was the floppy disk toss sponsored by a Mexican restaurant, a student lies down on a mattress and tosses a ball over his head trying to make a basket. Of course, there were various fans and students shooting baskets for prizes.

It was like a minor league baseball game; there was never a dull moment during the breaks in the action.

The dance team, the cheer leaders and band were entertaining too.

Oh and the food, can’t forget the yum yums.

There were the delish nachos with cheese, very good hot dogs, soft serve ice cream in two flavors and decent pop corn. But the real crown jewel of the concession stands was the shake machine that spits out shakes in eight different flavors. No mixing, just push the right button and presto, you get a pre-made shake.

All for pretty reasonable prices.

Oh, I almost forgot the Italian Ice that came in a bunch of interesting flavors; it was a big hit with the kids and me.

Back on the court, things were not looking good in the second half for the Panthers. Five minutes into the half the Bulldogs had a nine point lead.

But the fans kept cheering, the band kept playing and the Panthers slowly started to ship the lead down until at the 5:39 mark they got it down to two points at 50-48.

That was as close as they would get as Drake won 67-59.

That makes if very difficult for the 16-9 Panthers to get into the NCAA Tournament without wining the conference tournament next month in St. Louis. In conference play they are just 7-7.

Going into tonight’s game South Illinois was 20-5/11-3 MVC. Creighton was 17-7/11-3 MVC. Missouri State was 18-7/9-5 MVC.

In other words, The Valley teams are beating up on each other and they will be very fortunate to get three teams in the NCAA Tournament.

It is just another night in the Missouri Valley Conference, when about any team can win on any night.

As the fans button up their coats to go combat the frigid cold out side, they are a little sad their team lost.

But they should remember they just saw some great basketball in one of America’s most exciting conference and that should be worth something.

Best College Arena Atmosphere

Bill Kintner — Thu, 18 Jan 2007 14:38:53 -0500

As part of their Student Spirit Week, ESPN.com ran an article on “favorite arena atmospheres.”

They had seven ESPN writers and broadcasters list, then writes a short explanation of their top five arenas in terms of best game atmosphere. They described them as experts and I guess compared to the average fans I would concur.

So I decided to critique their picks and list my picks.

What are my credentials you might ask? I have been to over 260 college basketball arenas for games and by the time you read this the number I have visited may be even higher. While I am at those arenas I am actually recording and cataloging all the physical features of the arena and anything unique that adds to the atmosphere.

I am actually researching a book that I am writing on arenas, which explains why I am keeping such careful notes on each venue.

So let’s take a look at what the experts picked and then I will give you the correct answers.

Well, actually there are no correct answers. Everyone has his own perspective and criteria for rating college game atmospheres, which is why these endeavors are so fun. So get out a pen, develop your own criteria and let’s see what your list looks like.

Here are the arenas the ESPN guys picked.

Jay Bilas	Pat Forde	Fran Franschilla	Doug Gottlieb
Kansas Kentucky Indiana Big 5/Penn Butler	Duke Indiana Michigan St Arkansas Kentucky	Kansas Iowa St Oklahoma St Big 5/Penn New Mexico	Oklahoma St Illinois Kansas SIU Oklahoma
Andy Katz	Mark Schlabach	Kyle Whelliston
Duke Kansas Wisconsin Florida Gonzaga	Duke Kansas Kentucky Syracuse Florida	NC A & T Missouri St WKU Valparaiso Big 5/Penn

Most of the picks are pretty good. Many of the picks show a bias for the arenas each expert has spent time in. There are a few picks that are off-the-wall.

Speaking of off-the-wall let’s start with Kyle Welliston’s picks, because they are so unique. The first four I don’t have on my list. In fact, North Carolina A & T is the only arena of all the arenas listed that I have not visited.

Leave it to Kyle to stump me.

For the record I have pulled their schedule and I will be going down there to catch a game in the next 10 days.

Let me explain Kyle, he is the only ESPN expert that I really know and have any type of relationship with. He is a nut and that is why I like him, because I am a nut.

We e-mail or call occasionally. Sometimes we cross paths on the road. He is the mid-major expert at ESPN and he also has a very interesting web site of his own known as MidMajority.com.

Kyle spends his entire basketball season visiting the so-called mid-major schools. So his schools are a product of what he sees.

I operate on the chill factor. As I sit in an arena does the atmosphere send a chill down my spine? Then if it does, how much chill does it send down my spine?

Here are the schools the experts listed along with the number of times each school was listed. I have also listed the seating capacity, year it opened and my comments on each venue.

Arkansas--Bud Walton Arena (19,200) It opened in 1993. The Bud is big, comfortable and loud. It is almost pristine inside. It is used only for basketball, graduations and Wal*Mart Shareholder meetings. One of the better modern venues. A great college atmosphere when comfort meets tradition for the great fans that pack the place for games. The Chill factor is good.

Big Five/Penn (3)--The Palestra (8700) It opened in 1927. This is a basketball palace that is just dripping with basketball history. Take a walk around the concourse and look at all the memorabilia from the Big Five from years gone by. The fans sit on wooden bleachers and it gets very loud. The Palestra has character and tradition. It is a neat place even when it is empty. The chill factor is incredibly high. It was the site of the first NCAA Championship in 1939.

Butler--Hinkle Fieldhouse (11,043) It opened in 1928. When they filmed the championship game in the movie Hoosiers in Hinkle it brought the arena into the consciousness of modern day sports fans. It is just a wonderful place to catch a game. If you watch an afternoon game on a sunny day, the sun comes down through the windows high up the walls and you might just think you are in heaven. It doesn’t take many fans to get loud in historic Hinkle. The chill factor is off the charts.

Duke (3)—Cameron Indoor Stadium (9314) It opened in 1940. Neither the bleachers or the seats are very comfortable, but boy attending a game at Cameron sure is fun. The students are extremely entertaining and the place is loud. The history and character are great too. It sets the standard for college atmosphere. The chill factor is great!

Florida (2)—O’Connell Center (12,000) It opened in 1980. The fans are right on top of the court and they seem to go straight up. The students can get crazy, they seem to set the tone for the great atmosphere. The chill factor is good.

Gonzaga--McCarthy Athletic Center (6000) It opened in 2004. It is nothing fancy, but boy are the fans passionate. Loud is not problem here, the fans keep the noise level on high the whole game. The chill factor is pretty good.

Illinois--Assembly Hall (16,618) It opened in 1963. There is orange everywhere. The students are several rows deep in their courtside seats. The student section is one of the largest and they set the tempo for the upbeat atmosphere. And you can imagine how loud 16,000 fans can get? The chill factor is pretty good.

Indiana (2)—Assembly Hall (17,454) It opened in 1972. It is loud and passionate like Indiana fans should be. The fans in the front row bleachers are right up on the court. There is something special about it that I can’t put my finger on. Maybe it is the ghost of Bobby Knight. The upper decks seem to go straight up in the air. The chill factor is good.

Iowa State—Hilton Coliseum (14,092) It opened in 1971. The building itself will not give you chills it is pretty good, but not great. The fans can get so loud you can’t talk to the person next to you. Chill factor is fair.

Kansas (4)—Allen Field (16,300) It opened in 1950. The venue was listed the most times by our experts. The arena is fun and it has a ton of history. Allen has real character, it is certainly a unique basketball venue. The fans are right down on the court and it gets loud. Most of the seats are bleachers, which allow them to squeeze in 16,000 plus fans in a relatively small building. The chill factor is sky high.

Kentucky (3)—Rupp Arena (23,000) It opened in 1976. For a big venue it is actually a pretty good place to see a game. The fans are down close to the court and they know how to make a lot of noise. There is a sense of history and tradition in the building too. The chill factor is good.

Michigan State—Breslin Center (14,922) It opened in 1989. It is a comfortable arena that gets the fans down close to the court. The students are a big part of the action. It gets very loud and intimidating. The chill factor is pretty good.

Missouri State—Hammons Student Center (8846) It opened in 1976. It is a good place to see some good college hoops. The fans can get really loud for big games. But it is lacking a strong chill factor. The JQH Center will replace Hammons in 2008.

New Mexico—The Pit (18,018) It opened in 1966. A pretty neat arena, with a great design. But the fans are what make this venue so good. When they are packed in, it is loud and fun. The chill factor is pretty good.

North Carolina A & T—Corbett Sports Center (6700) Can’t comment on this one yet.

Oklahoma—Lloyd Noble Center (12,000) It opened in 1975. It is a decent arena and when the house is packed it is a great college atmosphere. The chill factor is fair and it depends on the fans, not the venue.

Oklahoma State (2)—Gallagher-Iba Arena (13,611) It opened in 1938. The history of this venue adds to the chill factor. The fans are close to the court and they are loud, loud and more loud. There is real energy in that building. The chill factor is incredible.

Southern Illinois—SIU Arena (10,000) It opened in 1964. This is a 1960’s venue from top to bottom. The fans are great, but the venue is just okay. The chill factor is fair.

Syracuse—Carrier Dome (33,000) It opened in 1980. For a football stadium, they do a great job of making it into a pretty good basketball arena. It certainly can get loud. But you really don’t get the chills that you get at other venues. Chill factor is fair.

Western Kentucky—E. A. Diddle Arena (7500) It opened in 1963. It a decent arena and I have not visited it since the $32 million renovation, which took out some seating and added luxury boxes. When they are playing a big game it gets loud and it is a fun college basketball atmosphere. The chill factor is fair.

Wisconsin—Kohl Center (17,190) It opened in 1998. One of the very best of the newer arenas. The crowd is close to the court and they are loud. You will see red from the playing floor to the last row. The chill factor is very good.

Valparaiso—Athletics-Recreation Center (5000) It opened in 1984. It is a decent arena or maybe a gym There is a certain charm to it The ARC gets loud at the right times, but is not perpetually loud. The chill factor is fair.

That is a pretty good list, but lets look at a few good choices they left off.

Oregon—MacArthur Court (9708) It opened in 1926. It is another one of those old gyms that is loaded with character, charm, history and tradition. Oregon has more wins in this gym, than any other school has in their venue. There are three seating levels that overlook the court, loaded with fans that are making noise the entire game. It is a building that will give you chills even if there is no game being played. The chill factor is off the charts

Minnesota—Williams Arena (14,625) It opened in 1928. Known as “The Barn” it has that unique raised floor that has the first row of fans looking at the action from knee level. The character, tradition and history make this an exciting building to just enter. When the student section known as the “Barn Yard” gets going it can really get rocking. The chill factor is very high.

Louisville—(18, 749) It opened in 1956. U of L has done a gone job of keeping the arena current. The seats come down close to the court filled with basketball-crazed fans that can hake a heck of a lot of noise. The building full of history and tradition. The chill factor is good. U of L will move into a new downtown arena in a few years.

Maryland—(17,950) It opened in 2002. It is a beauty of a building. It gets the fans right down to court-side. The students can make a whole lot of racket and sometimes they are little potty mouths. But if you want a great atmosphere in a modern venue with passionate fans, you will get all that here. The chill factor is good.

Okay now what you have all been waiting for……….my picks.

*Kansas

*Butler

*Oregon

*Duke

*Big Five/Penn

Just missed/honorable mention:

Minnesota

Oklahoma State

Kentucky

Wisconsin

This list is not the best arena in terms of the building. It is not the best fans, it is the best atmosphere and for that I will rely on the chills I get when I am at the game.

Poll: What is the Best College Basketball Arena?

Shawn Siegel — Mon, 15 Jan 2007 13:51:23 -0500