Changes coming to EagleBank Arena?

[MasonSAE4]

Not be contrarian but money is about as close to free as possible right now (at least for institutions with excellent bond ratings) so once COVID is in the rear-view and operating revenues stabilize, there literally may never be a better time to bond out a replacement/renovation of the arena.

A reno would be tough to pull off, though, because in non-COVID times the arena is so busy ... closing it for 18 months might not be an option.

True, but where on the list does it fall in terms of priority? I've seen like five projects consistently mentioned for years and EBA ain't one of them. I would assume it's at least on page 2.

 

[Pikapppatri8]

Not be contrarian but money is about as close to free as possible right now (at least for institutions with excellent bond ratings) so once COVID is in the rear-view and operating revenues stabilize, there literally may never be a better time to bond out a replacement/renovation of the arena.

A reno would be tough to pull off, though, because in non-COVID times the arena is so busy ... closing it for 18 months might not be an option.

Jim I would agree- capital is cheap and this project could be sold as not just for the university but a community impact project that would push growth and jobs. Given the new locker room - Mason could do what Liberty did - they redid their existing bowl and added club seats and suites and added lobby/concession space as well as sports offices and additional event space. And they did it with minimal closure to the main facility.

Mason has the land and space around the existing EBA to do this.

 

[MasonSAE4]

Jim I would agree- capital is cheap and this project could be sold as not just for the university but a community impact project that would push growth and jobs. Given the new locker room - Mason could do what Liberty did - they redid their existing bowl and added club seats and suites and added lobby/concession space as well as sports offices and additional event space. And they did it with minimal closure to the main facility.

Mason has the land and space around the existing EBA to do this.

Maybe a nice winning season that puts butts in seats will force the school to look seriously at it

 

[Pikapppatri8]

Maybe a nice winning season that puts butts in seats will force the school to look seriously at it

Strong point

 

[MasonSAE4]

Strong point

As of right now they must think "we can either build a relatively nice arena for 10,000 people, or we can build an arena for the 38 people who still go but everyone gets a luxury box"

 

[Five Two]

MSG did a multi-year complete renovation and I dont think their event schedule was altered too much. So EBA's schedule shouldnt be a factor. I think there was a line in a song about if you can make here (NY), you can make it anywhere. Same thing applies to arena renovations, IMO

 

[Pikapppatri8]

As of right now they must think "we can either build a relatively nice arena for 10,000 people, or we can build an arena for the 38 people who still go but everyone gets a luxury box"

Ok that made laugh - thank you sir.

As of right now they must think "we can either build a relatively nice arena for 10,000 people, or we can build an arena for the 38 people who still go but everyone gets a luxury box"

I think they should reduce total season to 8000 which includes a club seating area. add an additional event area for convocations. As you indicated with MSG - liberty redid the entire vines center while they had activities.

 

[MasonSAE4]

Ok that made laugh - thank you sir.


I think they should reduce total season to 8000 which includes a club seating area. add an additional event area for convocations. As you indicated with MSG - liberty redid the entire vines center while they had activities.

One thing I've always wanted is two distinct levels like the Ryan Center has. It would be cool to have an upper deck with some student section or something and have an electronic ticker running around the whole of the arena. And the Ryan center has a far lower capacity than EBA so it could def be done.

 

[GMUgemini]

One thing I've always wanted is two distinct levels like the Ryan Center has. It would be cool to have an upper deck with some student section or something and have an electronic ticker running around the whole of the arena. And the Ryan center has a far lower capacity than EBA so it could def be done.

The trick is to not lower the max capacity too much, since its size (approx. 10,000) attracts a lot of acts a smaller arena wouldn't (plus the fact that convocation is done there, and given the size of the graduating classes at Mason, going too small would be hard).

If we could, say, redo the bowl so that we have, say no fewer than 9,000 seats with some extra amenities (luxury boxes? an upper deck? an actual club room for the gold and green rooms?) I suppose ripping the roof off and making it slightly taller is out of the question?

 

[gmujim92]

The trick is to not lower the max capacity too much, since its size (approx. 10,000) attracts a lot of acts a smaller arena wouldn't (plus the fact that convocation is done there, and given the size of the graduating classes at Mason, going too small would be hard).

If we could, say, redo the bowl so that we have, say no fewer than 9,000 seats with some extra amenities (luxury boxes? an upper deck? an actual club room for the gold and green rooms?) I suppose ripping the roof off and making it slightly taller is out of the question?

Not out of the question, just mucho dinero

 

[Patriotsince81]

Our best average attendance was around 6,800 if memory serves me correctly. We haven't come close to that in the past 10 years. An arena of 6,000 would sit well with me. 7,ooo as an absolute max in my opinion.

 

[GMUgemini]

Our best average attendance was around 6,800 if memory serves me correctly. We haven't come close to that in the past 10 years. An arena of 6,000 would sit well with me. 7,ooo as an absolute max in my opinion.

7,000 would be fine is all it is for is basketball (think Siegel Center). A 7,000 seat arena to completely replace EBA and you'd lose pretty much every act that comes through Fairfax to other local arenas. It's also too small for convocation at our size. Also, we've had sellouts before, even multiple sellouts in the same season, when we were good (hell, we even had 9,300 fans show up for Northeastern in 2010-2011, and Northeastern was NOT GOOD that season). Why lower potential revenue because we don't average more fans per game?

 

[Patriotsince81]

7,000 would be fine is all it is for is basketball (think Siegel Center). A 7,000 seat arena to completely replace EBA and you'd lose pretty much every act that comes through Fairfax to other local arenas. It's also too small for convocation at our size. Also, we've had sellouts before, even multiple sellouts in the same season, when we were good. Why lower potential revenue because we don't average more fans per game?.

According to Wikipedia, and we all know how perfect they are, EBA has hosted 2,958 events since opening in 1985. So, that's about an average of 82 events per year. If you take out Mason sporting events (men's & women's) you are probably down to around 50 events. Many of those are high school graduations. So that leaves concerts and things like Disney on Ice, fights, the occasional circus etc. that make up the remaining events. The largest grossing concert was Springsteen in 2005. Largest crowd was for Phish. Largest gross was for Barnum and Bailey at 1.86 million in 2009. Point being that over the last 10 years I can't think of one really big event held there. It would be interesting to see a breakdown of how much the arena has netted GMU over the years. It may be time to downsize. Who knows. Better minds than mine can study that. All I know is it sucks to have so many empty seats for the showcase program, men's basketball. New coach, new blood, better results, maybe we'll pack the place. Our history says we won't no matter how good the team is.

 

[Pikapppatri8]

According to Wikipedia, and we all know how perfect they are, EBA has hosted 2,958 events since opening in 1985. So, that's about an average of 82 events per year. If you take out Mason sporting events (men's & women's) you are probably down to around 50 events. Many of those are high school graduations. So that leaves concerts and things like Disney on Ice, fights, the occasional circus etc. that make up the remaining events. The largest grossing concert was Springsteen in 2005. Largest crowd was for Phish. Largest gross was for Barnum and Bailey at 1.86 million in 2009. Point being that over the last 10 years I can't think of one really big event held there. It would be interesting to see a breakdown of how much the arena has netted GMU over the years. It may be time to downsize. Who knows. Better minds than mine can study that. All I know is it sucks to have so many empty seats for the showcase program, men's basketball. New coach, new blood, better results, maybe we'll pack the place. Our history says we won't no matter how good the team is.

Don't eff with the circus - or a - poster here will show up on your doorstep.

 

[Patriotsince81]

Don't eff with the circus - or a - poster here will show up on your doorstep.

As long as no elephant sh#t is left on the doorstep we'll work things out. LOL.

 

[GMUgemini]

According to Wikipedia, and we all know how perfect they are, EBA has hosted 2,958 events since opening in 1985. So, that's about an average of 82 events per year. If you take out Mason sporting events (men's & women's) you are probably down to around 50 events. Many of those are high school graduations. So that leaves concerts and things like Disney on Ice, fights, the occasional circus etc. that make up the remaining events. The largest grossing concert was Springsteen in 2005. Largest crowd was for Phish. Largest gross was for Barnum and Bailey at 1.86 million in 2009. Point being that over the last 10 years I can't think of one really big event held there. It would be interesting to see a breakdown of how much the arena has netted GMU over the years. It may be time to downsize. Who knows. Better minds than mine can study that. All I know is it sucks to have so many empty seats for the showcase program, men's basketball. New coach, new blood, better results, maybe we'll pack the place. Our history says we won't no matter how good the team is.

Ranked 63 in the world in 2019 at tickets sold (163,190). To Compare, Capitol One Arena sold 312,588 and was ranked 23rd.

This was a mid-year poll conducted in July, so before the basketball season started.

 

[Patriotsince81]

Ranked 63 in the world in 2019 at tickets sold (163,190). To Compare, Capitol One Arena sold 312,588 and was ranked 23rd.

This was a mid-year poll conducted in July, so before the basketball season started.

Impressive. Any info on number of events or average number of tickets sold per event?

 

[mkaufman1]

Impressive. Any info on number of events or average number of tickets sold per event?

Its hard to determine an exact number because the arena has at least 1/2 a dozen formations. For example, a family show is "half house" and probably a capacity of like 6000 at most.

That said the arena size while its big for basketball, serves the other types of events that come to the university really well. At some point in our lives it needs to be overhauled and/or replaced and my hope is that it would be smaller. After all, while the events they host are great, the building was built for basketball as the main attraction. I worked at the arena for 4 years and that is what I was always told.

 

[MasonSAE4]

A renovation also assumes that it's cost-efficient. At a certain point it becomes better to just start from the ground up.

 

[Pikapppatri8]

A renovation also assumes that it's cost-efficient. At a certain point it becomes better to just start from the ground up.

That is true - but with recent improvements to roof and other areas (lighting, sound, power, etc) the Vines reno approach could be cost effective.