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Yep. I'd be willing to bet the average St. M grad doesn't affiliate themself with Stanford, Cal, USC or UCLA. The average Akron alum is balls deep on a scarlet & grey dong.

I think this is a pretty good point. If the bball program (or athletic department/president/etc), is content with where we are, why invest additional money? If KD is content with Akron and 20 win seasons and scheduling cupcakes every year, and losing in the 1st round of whatever tournament they are in, what's the point?I'm all for spending money if it's done with forward thinking in mind and makes sense.

It was the City of Akron that proposed building a $70+ million arena/entertainment complex. No one has suggested that UA spend that much money on its own. What has been suggested is that a $50 million new arena might make more economic sense in the long run than a $38 million JAR renovation.

I feel like this discussion is missing a healthy dose of narcissism from gp1. This is the perfect bait thread. He is probably fighting to stay out while lurking anonymously in the shadows.

Sorry, but there is a difference between football and basketball and their respective facilities. I keep pushing for the downtown arena idea because it doesn't have to be just UA's venue. It could be used for much more, and UA wouldn't have to foot the entire bill. It is also possible to attract better teams to come play in a better arena. WVU played at the Wolstein Center. Akron could offer them part of the gate if we had a decent size gate to offer. I'd play tOSU twice at their place for once at ours, but not once at the Q. It's very shortsighted to focus only on Zips Basketball. I'd love to separate ourselves from the shortsightedness of those to our north. Morons in Cleveland had the opportunity to replace the mistake on the lake with an indoor football stadium, but shortsighted idiots prevailed and built an outdoor stadium on the same precious lake front property as the Depression-era former stadium. The stadium gets used a few times a year in addition to the Browns 10 games there. Had they built an indoor stadium, they could have hosted numerous events (Mens Final Four, potentially a Super Bowl like Detroit did, maybe a new Bowl game, other ...). Had they built it somewhere other than the lake front, they could have developed the lake front property like other cities with waterfronts have done.

I'd be willing to bet that St. Mary's also has a considerably more passionate/involved alumni base. It starts with alumni.

All of the millions

Is seating capacity really such a huge issue? St. Mary's "arena" only holds 3500. Also, don't forget potential VIP seating/ getting rid of that stupid square design and going to bowl seating will also help. Simple economics...what happens when demand is greater than supply? I don't see how it would hurt the U at all. If we aren't building a new arena, then who really cares if only basketball and volleyball will be played there along with an occasional ceremony. I care a lot more about aesthetics and meeting the needs of the fans at the game than the number of fans it holds.

I am not an alumni, I believe I stated so just saying that I was a fan of the school because it is tied to the area. It is real simple....the JAR is an awful place to watch basketball. But, no matter how terrible a place is, people will go see good basketball. Nobody that is Joe Akron is going to watch Akron play the MAC, sans Ohio and Ken.t. Cleveland St was even a good draw. A couple posts back, somebody mentioned Middle Tennessee, nobody in Akron has ever heard of that school before. I know it is beating a dead horse, but Dambrot has done this to himself. He wants a super soft schedule and play schools like Bluffton and the likes at home, he doesn't deserve attendance. I am never going to pay to see games against schools I have never heard of and I played college basketball. So how on earth do you expect to get the average Joe to come? New arena or not, nobody is coming to watch the awful schedule this school puts out year after year. If we could ever get into the CUSA, those are better name teams with the likes of UTEP, Marshall, Old Dominion, LaTech, Charlotte, etc.. but what it really allows is better competition and the ability to then have a better out of conference schedule with Ohio, Can't added to their new conference slate and hopefully the ability to get higher quality mid majors and low BCS programs to come into town. A better conference schedule at home, better competition, and still draw local crowds.