FYI: I just looked up arena capacity at ever D-I facility, along with build dates. While we are decidedly at the bottom of the Big Sky, we are only NEAR the bottom nationally; we are NOT the worst. Here's the Bottom Ten:
1. G.B. Hodge Center, USC Upstate (Big South), Spartanburg, SC: 878 built 1973
2. Buccaneer Field House, Charleston Southern (Big South), North Charleston, SC: 881 built 1965
3. Redhawk Center, U of Seattle (WAC), Seattle, WA: 999 built 1959
4. Sharp Gymnasium, Houston Baptist (Southland), Houston, TX: 1,000 built 1963
5. Hornet's Nest, Sacramento State (Big Sky), Sacramento, CA: 1,012 built 1955
6. Hammel Court, Merrimack (NEC), North Andover, MA: 1,200 built 1972
7. Generoso Pope Athletic Complex, St. Francis Brooklyn (NEC), Brooklyn, NY: 1,200 built 1971
8. The Jungle, IUPUI WBB (Horizon), Indianapolis, IN: 1,215 built 1982
9. Walsh Gymnasium, Seton Hall WBB (Big East), South Orange, NJ: 1,316 built 1941
T10. Swisher Gymnasium, Jacksonville (ASUN), Jacksonville, FL: 1,500 built 1953
T10. Swinney Recreation Center, MO-Kansas City (Summit), Kansas City, MO: 1,500 built 1941
I have no idea how these relate to the Nest in terms of feeling cramped, lack of locker and restroom facilities, concessions, and so on. Normally, I like old places (like Lambeau Field, where I would dearly love to stage a Super Bowl), but there's something about basketball arenas that screams against that. Being indoor sporting facilities, the things that might be forgivable in an aging outdoor facility immediately become issues when they're indoor. And with the Nest, there's none of the appeal of old buildings in terms of beauty; it's just sterile. Previously, I did bring up the Thundercr@p at UCSB and the gym at UC Riverside as being ghastly; they're both bigger in terms of capacity (Riverside at 3,168; UCSB at 5,600), but they're super ugly, and Riverside has a tendency of allowing visiting fans to take over. Heck, I've done that by myself at UCR. Some schools play in places that are artificially large, mainly because they play hoops where they play football, like NAU at the Walkup Skydome. The worst as far as that goes is the school with the absolute largest capacity: Syracuse at 35,446; that's just dumb. The SEC has a few schools that can seat around 20K; that also seems excessive to me for hoops. Here in the West, the WCC is losing outlier BYU next year to the Big XII, and with it an arena capacity of 19K; outside of them, the WCC average is 4,740, featuring a low of 3,104 at Pepperdine and a high of 6,150 at UOP. Pac-12: Avg: 11,801, Low: 7,329 (Stanford), High: 15,000 (Utah). MWC: Avg: 11,130, Low: 2,500 (UNLV WBB), High: 18,766 (UNLV MBB). WAC (minus the departing NMSU and Chicago State): Avg: 5,438, Low: 999 (Seattle), High: 10,476 (Lamar). Big West: Avg: 4,925, Low: 2,500 (CS-Northridge), High: 10,300 (Hawai'i). Big Sky (minus departing SUU): Avg: 5,983, Low: 1,012 (Sac State), High: 11,500 (Weber State).
My conclusion to all this rambling: While we are NOT the worst nationally, we ARE the worst both in conference and regionally. Even if we could afford to jump to the top, there's really no reason to, given that A. many schools at the top are there only because they co-locate their hoops teams in an indoor football facility, which does ZERO for either the playing or "fanning" experience, and B. nobody in the Western region is really doing that. I agree with most of you that a large upgrade is required, both in terms of capacity AND in terms of amenities and ambiance. We should NOT do what UNLV is doing, though, by separating MBB and WBB to such a large degree; that's degrading to women, IMO, and engenders a highly unnecessary duplication of effort. A similar analysis could be done for our football facilities, one that would align quite closely with the discussion we've already had about that. (Hornet Stadium is better in some facets than it was while I was there in the mid-to-late '90s, but it DOES leave a LOT to be desired that bean counters should NOT be allowed to nitpick away.) We need $$, and tons of it, because an athletic experience is a valuable part of the academic experience, and a good contribution to the community as a whole. We don't have to be the "new North Carolina," but we SHOULD have a decent arena of 5-10K with decent seats that don't seem as if they'll fall apart just by sitting in them, with easy access to restrooms and concessions and good locker room facilities for the teams, and a decent storage area for the materials required to shift from basketball to volleyball to gymnastics, and whatever other sports we have that could share the arena. And this is ESPECIALLY true if we as an institution indeed fulfill the desire of some in the community to jump to FBS; these upgrades would give us a position that would be well-placed among G5 programs, and even with some P5 programs (like Stanford). And even for guys like me who would like to remain in FCS, such moves would give us a strong advantage among FCS programs. So everyone wins. But where do we find the money, and how do we ensure it isn't siphoned for other projects like the bloody CA gas tax?
the negative energy on here is hilarious
