re: Will Wade hinting at PMAC renovations or possible new arena

I guess I don't understand most people's frustrations with the PMAC. Personally, I find it to be a pretty nice arena. The jumbotron is A+++ top of the line. The court looks much nicer than most. The seats have been upgraded and are much nicer than a lot of places. They isn't a ton of leg room, but that is certainly not the type of issue I think warrents a new arena.

There are some areas that could use a face lift but nothing close to a new arena....

The ceiling is started to look very dated. It needs to be repaired/replaced ASAP.

The exterior looks dated. This could be remedied similarly to what the Superdome did with lighting and a paint job.

While I enjoy the ramps, I can understand someone not liking them. You "could" tear them down and replace with a cool open area with large stairs where bands can be staged (similarly to Superdome's area).

I'm not sure if it makes any sense to remove the stadium and move it when we just built a practice facility onto one side of it. There's some facelift stuff but overall I enjoy the PMAC and the experience will continue to improve as the product gets better and the fans learn how to be good fans.

edit: and for the people wanting suits... Our fans already lack any excitement... Adding premium seating will hurt atmosphere. People in suits don't cheer. They sit back and drink and talk to clients who don't care about the team.

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Well the biggest thing is no premium seating... And while that wouldn't affect me every game, I'd definitely be interested in buying tickets in those sections on occasion.

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It would be very likely that all premium seating would be in the form of boxes controlled by corporations. It would be very unlikely that you could just buy tickets in a box for a game. It would be non-fans that come in for business. That's how NBA stadiums are set up besides courtside, which LSU could probably do a better job of selling courtside seats but its not a very common thing in college hoops.

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the lower portals on the south side ust don't need to be there at all (as you could add actual seating in those spaces)

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Lower portals need to be there for infrastructure reasons. That's where they bring in equipment with forlifts including staging for graduations and other events, the basketball court, the volleyball court, gym equipment. It holds offices, media rooms, and storage back there. Not to mention a lot of people use the lower entrances, especially older fans with less ability to climb.

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and the concourse is a shite show if/when the PMAC gets full (it's small)...

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The concourse is not small for a 13k arena; even when it's full. I have gone to nearly every game for almost 15 years and never had a problem because the concourse was too crowded. Can it be redone? Sure; but its not like it is a bad space.

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I'm just of the opinion that with all of the things that I think need to be changed, it makes more sense to just start over

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Personally I just think that is such an expensive thing to do given that the arena just had so many upgrades done and the practice facility is attached to the current arena.

Of course I can understand your opinion, but it just feels like a lot of added money that we don't need to undertake at the moment.

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I do think some kind of new arena would be the way to go rather than spend all kinds of money on the existing PMAC.

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I do think some kind of new arena would be the way to go rather than spend all kinds of money on the existing PMAC.

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I hope so. Instead they will spend as little as possible and folks will be disappointed in the outcome.

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Please, however, not a small one like Auburn and Ole Miss (been to both)

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what was your experience? it looks to me like ole miss' is a little better.

it seems to me that a new arena is just not going in the right direction. attendance is going down across the board. also, it seems that it would be a better investment to build a nicer, smaller arena. or it could be an option to do something like jpj arena - 14k

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Kinda reminds me of the impact Saban had when he got here. He had infrastructure implemented that put LSU into the upper echelon of schools.

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He also had a competent AD in Skip who understood the value in investing in facilities and the game day experience.

Wade is stuck with a Alleva, a cuck who wants to nickel and dime the fan base while investing as little as possible.

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The concourse is not small for a 13k arena; even when it's full. I have gone to nearly every game for almost 15 years and never had a problem because the concourse was too crowded. Can it be redone? Sure; but its not like it is a bad space.

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It gets a little claustrophobic honestly if you're talking about a packed house (OU last year comes to mind), I'm not talking like no room to move small, but it's not exactly spacious especially with people in it, also, being completely cut off from the court/action is another glaring issue, like you can't even really hear the PA announcer if you're going take a leak or getting some shitty concessions, granted the new TV's have helped, but I like still feeling connected to the game I'm attending when out there

Yeah pretty much, I'm happy either way they go here honestly... Because the current fan experience is pretty lacking at the moment (with the exception of the amazing video board)

When push comes to shove I personally think people just hate how aesthetically horrific the pmac looks. People would never be complaining about the arena if it matched the campus architecture. There’s not a bad seat in the arena, nice scoreboard, nice practice facility, etc...it boils down to the exterior. Jmo

I don’t believe so. It was the old practice gym for the basketball teams. Full size court with some extra goals around the gym and a simple scoreboard.

They referred to it as the “dungeon” because that is what it felt like. You took a long set of steps below ground to get to it and there were no windows to it.

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the dungeon

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When I was in Bengal Brass from 99-01, we used that space to warm up, store our cases, etc. it wasn’t as bad as it sounds. It was well-lit and in decent shape. But a lot can change in 17 years. Especially since it was used as a morgue in the aftermath of Katrina.