New Basketball Arena

[TroyTrojanMan]

We need a new arena so badly, when it comes to the sunbelt. I am watching ESPN right now and #3 Illinois is playing Arkansas AT ARKANSAS LITTLE ROCK a sun belt school, that is how big and nice there arena is that they are able to host a game between an SEC/Big 10 school. We barely have enough room at the end of the year to host the high school tourney. In football our stadium in the sunbelt is by far the best. I hate to say when we get in the sunbelt our basketball gym will be one of the worse. I have been to South Alabama and Western KY and there's are just amazing.

[theboro]

That's AllTell Arena in Little Rock. It's the equivalent of the BJCCC in B-Ham or the Gaylord Entertainment Center in Nashville.

It's not their on campus arena. That's in the process of being built.

Just renovate. That's what most of the schools have done.

I think in the next couple of years MT is taking out a couple of thousand seats, leaving just chairbacks and making some improvements on the upper level (just what i've heard)

Better to have a a 9,000 seat arena three quarters full than a 12,000 seat arena half full I guess.

WKU, USA, UALR all have top notch arenas. We're trying to get there. (Ours was state of the art 32 years ago, alas, the new floor last year was the first improvement in god knows how long)

What the SBC needs to do is have NICE arenas. Give up some size for quality.

If everyone has a NICE 8,000 seat arena and averaging 6500 a game. We'll be in great shape.

P.S. if you ever go to UNO don't laugh too loud.

It looks gorgeous on the outside. But they play in an inner gym the size of a high school that looks worse than Butler's field house (Hoosiers)

[troydad]

Au contraire, my friend! Butler's Hinkle Fieldhouse is one of the nicest basketball arenas in the nation--with the best floor in the country!

Troy's arena would fit in one section of Hinkle. Yeah, the Trojans need to get this corrected as soon as possible. Maybe right after they get the radio broadcasts on the internet.

[theboro]

The floor may be nice, but Hinkle as a whole is a hole.

Not to mention that most everyone at Butler is a hole.

I hate them.

[troymarkus]

When we renevated it was just a short fix. We need a new arena and from what I understand, that is the first big project the new AD will begin working on. If we are going to compete year in and year out in the Belt, we've got to have better facilities basketball-wise.

[TrojanHoarse]

Just renovate. That's what most of the schools have done.

We did that several years back and it looks nice, but we have strectched the existing building to its limits. It'd be a GREAT high school arena, but is not up to the level we feel TROY UNIVERSITY deserves. Everyone agrees on that, now it is just a matter of deciding the on-campus site and getting the funding lined up. It won't be long. I hope bringing in a new AD will actually speed that process up, rather than be a bump in the road to getting a new arena.

[TrojanHoarse]

Markus and I were posting (above) the same thing at the same time. I told you we all agree about the need to build vs. renovate 8)

[TropolitanSportsEditor]

Theoretically they could pave in the tailgating area behind the baseball field, which they are considereing doing anyway. Mark it off with parking spaces, then take the current gym and expand it into the parking lot it is next to now. I don't think that we need an OKlahoma or Auburn size arean,hell even Lipscombs arena which is gorgeous is too big for their school. But if you expand it into that parking lot, you can move the court back to the center and create more seats on either side as well as increase the size of the section that the band is in now.

If you realign the concession stand on the left side of the arena but do not move the other one, then you can increase the size drastically by just expanding the builing into the parking lot oh say 200 feet. Which might run it to the road anyway.

Then add a little more height and they will have a basketball arena that for the next ten years is as big as they need it.

But those are just my thoughts.

See this is our schools problem,they never guessed that we would begin to get as big as we are getting. SO over the years they allowed the city to grow in around the university,now we have no where to grow.

Maybe they could do what auburn did and have an academic and athletic area seperate from each other.

There is plenty of cowspace to use around the county that isn't but about 5 minutes from campus. How cool would it be to have a whole section off campus dedicated to the athletics, with the football stadium staying where it is to give students a chance to tour the campus before the games. The other sports don't really generate that big of a following, I think it would work.

[TropolitanSportsEditor]

Oh,
I know for a fact that the next stadium in line for more renovations is the baseball field. They hopefully going to put in a 25 foot wall in right field which has an animated scoreboard to run graphics on inset into the wall. They are going to get a new field, a covered practice facility and a new dug out that has a second floor for coaches offices and the like, lockerooms hopefully built in and new bullpens. Plus a hitter's eye behind the centerfield wall. As well as decking in left field for organizations and students to sit,eat, drink, and be rowdy.

I know this because I did all the conceptual graphics for coach Pierce. It's a great project.

I wish the university had the money to do both the arena and the baseball field at the same time.

[T-Rotten]

I do not understand why the baseball field is next on the to-do list. The University has constantly turned its back on basketball. When the move to D-1 was made, basketball took the biggest hit as they could not compete for the Dance for 8 years. Maestri and Felix struggled to attract players to come and play for nothing. However, they continued to succeed.
Now, the only drawback Troy has is the size of Trojan Arena. There is a lot of money for teams making the dance, but it is hard for Maestri and Felix to attract top level talent to Troy because of our facilities. Football, baseball, track, softball and tennis all have top-notch facilities. There are plans to upgrade Movie Gallery Stadium and now you say the next upgrade is to Riddle-Pace. The Admin needs to make a solid commitment to basketball.
In my opinion, Maestri and Felix are by far the best coaches in the state and have done more with less for far to long.

[TrojanWar]

I am watching ESPN right now and #3 Illinois is playing Arkansas AT ARKANSAS LITTLE ROCK a sun belt school, that is how big and nice there arena is that they are able to host a game between an SEC/Big 10 school.

And they were stupid for doing so. Bud Walton Arena in Fayetteville holds over 20,000 and would have been filled to near capacity for this game. It is the most amazing basketball complex I have ever seen. Obviously, Troy does not need anything like this, but we could use a 10,000 seat Arena. As of now, we have no "arena." We have a gym. Arkansas State has a great basketball arena. We need something on that level once we get into Sun Belt play. As bad as we are right now, I hope we get much better before we start playing BBall in the Belt. There are some VERY good teams in the conference.

[Trojan1998]

I just made it back to Montgomery from Durham, NC. I went to my very first (and not my last) Duke basketball game last night at Cameron Indoor Stadium. The Devils beat Toledo, and I was there to see Coach K win his 700th game (pretty amazing sight after the game when he addressed the crowd). We had mid-court seats and got to walk on the floor and visit with Blue Devil players after the game - incredible place to say the least.

Anyway, for those of you who've never experienced a game at Cameron, it is truly an amazing scene (I recommend that every college basketball fan go to at least one game at Cameron). But what is most intriguing is that Cameron is a tiny box that only holds 9,000 fans (and it really doesn't seem like it holds that many - more like half that number). Trojan Arena/Sartain Hall is actually a nicer facility than Cameron, however, I realize that Duke keeps Cameron that way for a reason and will not change it anytime soon. What Troy does need is not necessarily an arena that seats 10,000, but one that seats possibly at least 7,000 or 8,000 thousand so that it can also be used for major indoor concerts and other big-time events that the university could hopefully attract to campus.

Coach Maestri told me earlier this fall that the Sunbelt has great basketball facilities and that we need to have a more modern basketball arena if we're going to compete for championships in the Belt. He commented to me on how Western Kentucky University's basketball arena cost twice as much to construct as Movie Gallery Veterans Stadium!!! USA has the Mitchell Center in Mobile (best facility in Alabama), UNO has Lakefront Arena (been there and it's very nice), UNT has fabulous facility, the Cajun Dome in Lafayette is first class, etc., etc., etc.

Hopefully once our administration gets a really good idea on what we're up against in the Sunbelt as far as facilities are concerned, they'll do whatever is necessary to make sure we have a top-notch bball facility - much sooner than later.

[troymarkus]

Trop...sorry to burst your bubble, but the next big project will be a basketball arena. Check out the good article in Trojan News magazine for reference. Not sure when it will be, but it is next.