Future of the XL Center as a Home Site

[LBird33]

Way back in the day, I actually had a conversation about this with Jeff Hathaway. I think Tim White, (Pudge…rest in peace), was with me and we had asked why UConn never considered a 15,000 seat on campus arena. The answer was something like, we could park 12,500 fans but it got dicey over that - so that number always felt right-size to me.

But this is entirely an unemotional argument. I don’t mind Hartford, but I know what it would cost to replace XL ($700M) or reno it ($250M) and I know those numbers are not doable. The facility will not generate revenue and the deal will just get worse for UConn.

On-campus is the future. Short-term, no problem…we have Gampel. Mid-term, what do we do to plan for the future given that Gampel is 30+ years old? If there is a magic bullet of a plan that gets 12,500 seats without simply shrinking the current seating, great. If there’s not, well, time to start planning.

I think there’s more parking on campus now. Go. 15k

 

[Edward Sargent]

St John's Carnesecca Arena holds 5602 for seating. It looks like a high school gym and I could never figure out how the Big East allowed them to build such a small arena. Here is a picture:

Carnesecca Arena - St. John's University Athletics

Directions to Carnesecca Arena | Carnesecca Seating Chart | Guest Policy | Carnesecca Arena Photo Gallery | Summer 2019 Facility Upgrades Formerly known as A...

redstormsports.com

I don't know how many games are at the garden vs on campus.

Seton Hall?

 

[storrsroars]

Okay, I have cracked it.

This is a 48,000 seat dome on campus with sufficient parking.

You might have some questions like, what happened to South Campus? Did you pave it over for parking? And where did the library go?

Those are stupid questions. I know what I’m doing.

It could have two levels of suites, each built with murphy beds and desks that double as dorm rooms, sleeping four each. You give the students gift certificates for Ted's each game to get them out and fans take over the space.

 

[August_West]

A seat donation is part of the season ticket package what are you talking about it has nothing to do with ad hoc donations. As noted the lower bowl around mid court go for $800 a season. The donation goes down as the seats get worse obviously, but it's non zero. That's a big part of this picture that is ignored.

You're now switching the argument and moving goalposts. Nobody is arguing that they take home is less at the civic center than Gampel. My position is that the school isn't public with the full picture and that being in Hartford has other benefits that serve to benefit UConn.

I don’t disagree with a lot of this, but you are in Florida and not flying up for home games.

 

[Storrs South]

Seton Hall?

I promise you, you do not want to model anything you are doing based on Seton Hall from an operations and facilities standpoint.

They have a high school gym on campus that has a stage at one of that gym used for all WBB games that is severely dated with minimal amenities.

Then MBB plays in what I experienced earlier this season as one of the more stale sports environments I've experienced in person at Prudential that they only use the lower bowl (curtain off entire upper deck) and the students are similarly situated as they are at the XL Center minus an upper deck.

 

[Fishy]

It could have two levels of suites, each built with murphy beds and desks that double as dorm rooms, sleeping four each. You give the students gift certificates for Ted's each game to get them out and fans take over the space.

We have 48,000 seats. We can swap them for cots.

The ConnDome is versatile.

 

[Husky25]

UConn has been playing in Hartford for near 50 years. Pre-Calhoun and pre-national exposure. Now that UConn is a draw and a driver, fat chance they stop playing there. The agreement will probably be reworked, the schedule should be reworked, people will continue to _itch, and life will go on.

 

[kemba]

I'm not the one in denial lol. It's clean and has great sightlines. It's limited but not a dump. And I would bet some decent money they renovate it in the next few years which will only improve it.

Right. It’s a great place to watch college basketball and a great environment. Not a bad seat in the house. It’s not state of the art, the vast majority of college only on campus facilities aren’t. Definitely not a dump.

 

[uconnfan68]

We have 48,000 seats. We can swap them for cots.

The ConnDome is versatile.

Shouldn’t that be ConnDom?

 

[Waquoit]

If moving to Storrs means losing you because you can’t drive to Storrs, see ya.

I'm surprised how tone deaf this comment is. The exodus has already happened.

 

[ConnHuskBask]

I don’t disagree with a lot of this, but you are in Florida and not flying up for home games.

I'm in Jersey - but why is that relevant? I personally don't care where they play the games, I actually like both venues and have had season tickets to both.

My point from the beginning is that I think there are benefits of playing in Hartford that aren't worth torpedoing due to what amounts to a rounding error in the grand scheme of things.

 

[formerlurker]

Seton Hall?

Those buildings were Grandfather claused in. Gampel had different minimum seating requirements from the BE when it was being planned and built. At the time, we went with the very minimum allowed. Who knew we'd have 15 combined NCAA hoops National Championships 30 years or so later? Sucks.

 

[August_West]

I'm in Jersey - but why is that relevant? I personally don't care where they play the games, I actually like both venues and have had season tickets to both.

My point from the beginning is that I think there are benefits of playing in Hartford that aren't worth torpedoing due to what amounts to a rounding error in the grand scheme of things.

What are the benefits for the school?

 

[zls44]

Okay, I have cracked it.

This is a 48,000 seat dome on campus with sufficient parking.

You might have some questions like, what happened to South Campus? Did you pave it over for parking? And where did the library go?

Those are stupid questions. I know what I’m doing.

And people say there's no leaders anymore. This is g-d vision.

 

[zls44]

I'm surprised how tone deaf this comment is. The exodus has already happened.

Every game has been packed to the gills, so...

 

[CL82]

Okay, I have cracked it.

This is a 48,000 seat dome on campus with sufficient parking.

You might have some questions like, what happened to South Campus? Did you pave it over for parking? And where did the library go?

Those are stupid questions. I know what I’m doing.

Wait, a new arena and they’re going to put the concourse around Gampel?

 

[CL82]

They have a high school gym on campus that has a stage at one of that gym used for all WBB games that is severely dated with minimal amenities

I was just there. They just finished a renovation. It actually looks pretty nice, I mean it’s still, literally, has a stage on one end and offices on the other side, but pretty nice.

 

[ConnHuskBask]

What are the benefits for the school?

Certainly seems like plenty of our fans prefer the split: XL Gampel or both and then I think there are benefits to curry favor with the state.

And again, I don't care where they ultimately play I just thought the public comments were dumb and amount to relative peanuts.

 

[superjohn]

“Super suburban” is also a mindset. All encompassing for the anti-city crowd.

Connecticut has always blown it on their cities. I don't know if that's what has led to the attitude of many of the state residents or if the people who reside there just want nothing to do with small cities which are poorly planned. The things that hold Hartford back today are the same things that have always held the city back. It's footprint is laughably small. West Hartford, East Hartford, Windsor, Newington etc. should be a part of Hartford...that's the way it is in the rest of the country. You don't run a highway through the middle of your city cutting it off from it's biggest asset (the water) and you don't cut off an entire section of your city from it's downtown.

I love cities, the state of Connecticut doesn't like cities. I always wished Hartford was a vibrant young city with a state of the art downtown arena but the state has decided against these things... Even though it's a state school it shouldn't be UConn's duty to bring life to Hartford and they shouldn't be forced to play in a decrepit arena that's 20 years past it's shelf life where the school takes in none of the money. If they want to build a new downtown arena, great or somehow find a way to totally revamp the existing structure, great. Neither of those options seem feasible these days.

 

[superjohn]

You’re in denial, pampered by memories of old. It’s okay, I am too, I love Gampel. But Gampel is much closer to XL than it is to newer, state of the art arenas that others are building. 1990 is a long, long time ago in design and engineering. A classic place for sure, but a dump.

When the day comes to replace it, I have zero faith in the University to get it right either. It’ll end up a catastrophe like the rinky dink Ice Barn that we overpaid for. You could find more legit Pee Wee hockey arenas in Canada.

Yep and Cameron Indoor, Allen Fieldhouse, Mackey, Hinkle Fieldhouse are all dumps.

Gampel is a great place to watch a college basketball game and there's a ton of history packed under those Italian tiles.

 

[superjohn]

Horse is partially out of the barn on this one. Even Massachusetts got it right with the Mullin Center. We should have built a new on campus facility that was the home to hockey and basketball and seats 12K. Multi purpose, modern, could have taken the money dumped into the Toscano Center and merged it with the new place. Additionally, it would have gotten UConn much more money in naming rights as well.

I agree Toscano should be a bit bigger, probably 4,200 capacity but not many people go to college hockey games. A 12,000 seat arena for basketball and hockey would feel empty for hockey games. The large college hockey arenas are lucky if they're half full. UMass should never be looked at as a template because they never get anything right. They average less than 4,000 basketball fans at Mullins and around the same amount for hockey.

If we built a state of the art 12,000 joint basketball/hockey facility on campus the same people who complain about everything would be whining about wasting all that money on a new arena that's barely bigger than Gampel which has none of the history and they would be whining about it being empty for hockey games.

 

[UCann]

Connecticut has always blown it on their cities. I don't know if that's what has led to the attitude of many of the state residents or if the people who reside there just want nothing to do with small cities which are poorly planned. The things that hold Hartford back today are the same things that have always held the city back. It's footprint is laughably small. West Hartford, East Hartford, Windsor, Newington etc. should be a part of Hartford...that's the way it is in the rest of the country. You don't run a highway through the middle of your city cutting it off from it's biggest asset (the water) and you don't cut off an entire section of your city from it's downtown.

I love cities, the state of Connecticut doesn't like cities. I always wished Hartford was a vibrant young city with a state of the art downtown arena but the state has decided against these things... Even though it's a state school it shouldn't be UConn's duty to bring life to Hartford and they shouldn't be forced to play in a decrepit arena that's 20 years past it's shelf life where the school takes in none of the money. If they want to build a new downtown arena, great or somehow find a way to totally revamp the existing structure, great. Neither of those options seem feasible these days.

I agree. The real issue is that the XL needs to be replaced with a new, modern, major league arena. Not renovated, replaced. So what if we will never attract an NHL team…the state needs a modern large arena. With modern amenities and suites etc. Concerts would return and UConn would not complain about playing there as revue would likely be significantly higher. The state needs to find $500m to $1b somehow to get this done.

 

[krinklecut]

Connecticut has always blown it on their cities. I don't know if that's what has led to the attitude of many of the state residents or if the people who reside there just want nothing to do with small cities which are poorly planned. The things that hold Hartford back today are the same things that have always held the city back. It's footprint is laughably small. West Hartford, East Hartford, Windsor, Newington etc. should be a part of Hartford...that's the way it is in the rest of the country. You don't run a highway through the middle of your city cutting it off from it's biggest asset (the water) and you don't cut off an entire section of your city from it's downtown.

I love cities, the state of Connecticut doesn't like cities. I always wished Hartford was a vibrant young city with a state of the art downtown arena but the state has decided against these things... Even though it's a state school it shouldn't be UConn's duty to bring life to Hartford and they shouldn't be forced to play in a decrepit arena that's 20 years past it's shelf life where the school takes in none of the money. If they want to build a new downtown arena, great or somehow find a way to totally revamp the existing structure, great. Neither of those options seem feasible these days.

This is because of the very New England idea of local municipality identity. Everything is on the individual town level and there’s very little governance between municipalities. Elsewhere in the country government typically consists of both local and county government. Not so much so in New England.

 

[1999GoodSon]

Ok now that we solved this problem and we all clearly agree on this, it's on to Omaha!

 

[Tuna]

You think someone who is giving big time money is going to stop because 8/9 more games are being played on campus??? Don’t think those people have to worry about getting out of work early to make the games

I know this for a fact.

 

[Tuna]

I'm bringing seat donations into the discussion as a relevant piece of information but not drawing any definitive conclusions based off of it.

You have claimed they lose money on the games played in Hartford multiple times in this thread by passing that off as a fact, when by your own admission have said you didn't take into account seat donations.

If anyone has those numbers it would be UConn, right? UConn is trying to make a compelling case as to why they shouldn't play in Hartford and the only numbers the President cites are expenses. You would think it would make their case more definitively compelling could they state we're a net money loser. But they don't, which leads me to believe it's break even at worse and most likely a net positive.

/thread

 

[Fishy]

I asked the AD on Twitter about the concourse idea….no real details, but something appears to be cooking.