The crowd looked and sounded awesome!

[iubud]

I wasn't at the game, but my son was. He said the section he sat in was on their feet most of the game. I sat in those seats earlier this year and that section was glued into their seats. There was a Maryland fan a few rows back that yelled "Boom" when one of their players made an early 3. My son said for the rest of the game, the whole section yelled "Boom" after our made 3's. I wonder if the MD fan is sorry they started that?

My son got to AH 40 minutes before the game and the student first come first serve seating and most of the rest of the section was already full. They had been waiting in line all day. The crowd looked and sounded very good, but I know it is louder in person than the TV portrays. Keep it up fans.

BTW, if you can't use your tickets, don't sell them to opposing fans. That goes double for PUkes. Although I don't know why they would want to come to AH to watch the Broilers play.

 

[cheyennemtnman]

nailed it

students set tone for the night

 

[iubhounds]

I knew the students would be loud

The crowed smelled blood in the water, like they normally do when a ranked team walks on the court of Assembly Hall. Like one of the ESPNU booth announcers said last night, who had been an assistant coach of a team that played at Assembly Hall ... coaches can't hear coaches, players can't hear coaches and players can't hear players.

Standing on the floor at center court, those stands look like they go straight up, and the noise is awesome. If they ever decide to build a new AH, I hope they will make the stands just as steep for noise purposes but that will never happen.

 

[kkott]

I'm not sure how you do it, but I'd say a successful new arena design

would try to incorporate as much of the "good" aspects of AH as possible. To me that would be the steeper angle of the stands and a more "vertical" design, and the banners in a prominent end of court position. They need to engineer out the balcony overhang obstruction and should probably do away with the balcony altogether, as I think all it does is distance those seats from the floor ( I suppose the argument is it moves them closer, but it steepens the viewing angle). I think we also need seating behind the basket and 360 deg, and obviously they'll add suites. I think a good architect could accomplish this with in a new arena. I love the home court advantage and cathedral like appearance of AH, but frankly don't like it overall and think a redesign would be a great goal to aspire to.

 

[iubhounds]

Have you heard the reason for all the seats on the sides?

In one of my IU basketball history books it explained why AH has a large majority of seats on the sides. The original design for a new basketball "fieldhouse" was made in the 50's, when they had wood backboards. They wanted the majority of seats on the sides so fans would not be blocked by wood backboards. Then money was an issue, so the plans were held up as the football stadium was finished. Money issues is why the west stands are taller than the east stands in Memorial Stadium.

So they had the new builders build AH off of some updated designs but still held the theory of more seats on the sides.

Now, RMK always said the best seat to watch basketball was on the ends of the court. I am not sure how far the suggestion went up the chain of command at IU, but RMK did mention once he preferred the court to be turned 90°, so the majority of the seats would be on the end of the court.