lovelldog wrote:

Anyone know how many the Orleans seats? I was there for that tournament and am guessing it seats 4,000 or so, although I wasn't really trying to estimate at the time so I could be way off.

Even for the game between UNLV and BYU the stands were probably only 60% full as there was a lot of space left up top and there are always open space throughout. It seems like you could make it work somehow. I agree even though it is only 15 minutes from the Thomas & Mack Center that it would make a difference. It wouldn't take the advantage away but at least its a start.

The Orleans seats 9500. link http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orleans_Arena

What is the capacity of the Thomas & Mack?

I have to disagree, if we play at the Orleans Arena, it will still be filled with all UNLV fans. Now I'm not sayin that playing in the same court as their home court isn't an advantage, cuz it is, but honestly, I think its more the 20,000 fans screaming and yelling. just my thought

Illinois1Cougar wrote:

PHX is the best place to play the tourny. It makes sense because it kinda sits in the center of the conference. Im sure plenty of fans would go there. Denver didnt work, because its not an inviting city. There are way more things to do in PHX, plus its easy to get there, from anywhere!

Plus......the Big 12 plays thier conference tourny in St. Louis, and they dont have any teams from there.

The Big 12 plays their tourney in Kansas City/Dallas and now Oklahoma City - all with neutral arenas. I don't think they've played in St. Louis in quite some time and never wanted to but Kemper arena in KC was a pile of crap and they didnt' want to come back here until we had a new arena(which we do now)

Honestly, while it gives UNLV a bit of an advantage;
If we ever want to be considered a preeminant hoops power, we have to win in spite of that. It's not like the conference tourney is played in the Pit or at the MC (the deck isn't as stacked in Vegas for conference teams), winning in Vegas is more than possible. Yeah it sucks that we couldn't play defense in the 2nd half or handle their perimeter defense, but we still should have won that game, regardless of where it's played.
Again, I think we should concentrate on what the team can control: coaching and production on the court. We didn't deliver that vs UNLV:

I dont' care if we were playing the "university of frozen alaskan eskimos" at the north pole; we still can't win if we don't execute and play our game. We had a 12 point lead when we played our game and then we forgot how for the 2nd half.

stuckinbig10country wrote:

1. There are only 2 destination cities in the conference area at the end of Winter: Las Vegas and San Diego. The San Diego arena does not allow alcohol sales because it is on campus. The Thomas & Mack is an off-campus facility and thus allows alcohol sales. Let's remember that the conference tournaments are to make the leagues money, not to crown a champion..

It's sad that BYU is in an amateur sports league that is more concerned about alcohol sales and making money than the sports themselves. Might as well just watch the NBA.

Thomas & Mack seats 19,500. BYU-UNLV had 16,000. Second round averages about 12,000. First round averages about 7,000.