Albany March Madness

[SIENA1971]

Saw Indiana was using St Rose’s facilities for practice … anyone know if Siena hosted anyone

[diamonddog]

Mar 16, 2023 11:56:04 GMT -5 SIENA1971 said:

Saw Indiana was using St Rose’s facilities for practice … anyone know if Siena hosted anyone

Drake practiced at Siena

[gorvy]

Penn ends his career on the same floor that he started his career which is rare for a tournament team.

[siena77]

Does anyone else who attended the tournament yesterday in Albany think it was a complete sh1tshow? The basketball was top shelf, great to see all these teams in town. But the tipoff times by the NCAA, including tomorrow's (6:10 & 8:40), show no concern for people with jobs, those who travel long distances, students, etc. Real arrogance.

But the condition of the arena is worse. Broken seats, rest room lines that backed up onto the seating level, toilets that don't flush, running out of food, the between-sessions food availability outside the arena--we were fortunate that the weather wasn't rainy or cold.

I try to look at it from what out-of-towners are experiencing, and I can't imagine they were positively impressed by the condition of the MVP. I hope their experiences with local hotels and restaurants were better.

[OneIndian]

Mar 18, 2023 10:15:59 GMT -5 siena77 said:

Does anyone else who attended the tournament yesterday in Albany think it was a complete sh1tshow? The basketball was top shelf, great to see all these teams in town. But the tipoff times by the NCAA, including tomorrow's (6:10 & 8:40), show no concern for people with jobs, those who travel long distances, students, etc. Real arrogance.

But the condition of the arena is worse. Broken seats, rest room lines that backed up onto the seating level, toilets that don't flush, running out of food, the between-sessions food availability outside the arena--we were fortunate that the weather wasn't rainy or cold.

I try to look at it from what out-of-towners are experiencing, and I can't imagine they were positively impressed by the condition of the MVP. I hope their experiences with local hotels and restaurants were better.

Yes unfortunately. The MVP is definitely showing it’s age, broken dirty seats, & the seating is too damn cramped & uncomfortable, restrooms were disgusting, food lines were ridiculous but I don’t eat that crap anyway, concourse is too small & too easily overcrowded and there’s too much wasted under utilized space in the enclosed front. Can’t imagine out of town fans were all that impressed.

It really needs a functional overhaul, but I doubt that’s even possible due to the footprint. The arena was modified to hold 17k max and 15k for sports unfortunately it has the functionality of building for 10k Make it smaller & the NCAA takes a flyer on Albany.

I agree game times were pretty late but that’s the NCAA not the MVP’s doing. Not much better for Sunday either.

[bigsaintg]

UCONN fans were torching the arena on Twitter

[hoopdad]

I thought once in the arena the experience was great. Excellent reminder of how fun and loud it can be when sold out. Unfortunately the rest of the experience, entrance, both food and bathroom lines, getting around the concourse and even in front of arena on Pearl St. was an absolute shit show! I am afraid that as the arena exists today, this might be Albany's last NCAA tourney, which is too bad, because it is so much fun seeing this level of basketball in person.

[indian82]

Mar 18, 2023 13:31:40 GMT -5 hoopdad said:

I thought once in the arena the experience was great. Excellent reminder of how fun and loud it can be when sold out. Unfortunately the rest of the experience, entrance, both food and bathroom lines, getting around the concourse and even in front of arena on Pearl St. was an absolute shit show! I am afraid that as the arena exists today, this might be Albany's last NCAA tourney, which is too bad, because it is so much fun seeing this level of basketball in person.

I don't disagree. The arena as it was designed & built 34 years ago and downtown Albany in general is not conducive to holding 15,000 people in a short period of time. And the times we got from the NCAA for the 2 sessions did not help.

And PLEASE either get a new concession or get Aramark to up their menu.

I was at AC last week and the choice of food there was infinitely better.

[hoopdad]

Mar 18, 2023 13:35:25 GMT -5 indian82 said:

Mar 18, 2023 13:31:40 GMT -5 hoopdad said:

I thought once in the arena the experience was great. Excellent reminder of how fun and loud it can be when sold out. Unfortunately the rest of the experience, entrance, both food and bathroom lines, getting around the concourse and even in front of arena on Pearl St. was an absolute shit show! I am afraid that as the arena exists today, this might be Albany's last NCAA tourney, which is too bad, because it is so much fun seeing this level of basketball in person.

I don't disagree. The arena as it was designed & built 34 years ago and downtown Albany in general is not conducive to holding 15,000 people in a short period of time. And the times we got from the NCAA for the 2 sessions did not help.

And PLEASE either get a new concession or get Aramark to up their menu.

I was at AC last week and the choice of food there was infinitely better.

Thank you for bringing the food up I82.  100% agree.  Quality, choices are awful and not a single healthy option to be found.  You would think that venue run by the County that hosts so many family oriented events would offer some fresh and healthy options to the fried, highly processed and sugar packed ones you can only currently get.

[james]

My seat was also broken and noticed coming up from the bathrooms the entire floor area is in need of a pressure washing but thought the games were excellent!

[SienaRocks]

Mar 18, 2023 10:15:59 GMT -5 siena77 said:

Does anyone else who attended the tournament yesterday in Albany think it was a complete sh1tshow? The basketball was top shelf, great to see all these teams in town. But the tipoff times by the NCAA, including tomorrow's (6:10 & 8:40), show no concern for people with jobs, those who travel long distances, students, etc. Real arrogance.

But the condition of the arena is worse. Broken seats, rest room lines that backed up onto the seating level, toilets that don't flush, running out of food, the between-sessions food availability outside the arena--we were fortunate that the weather wasn't rainy or cold.

I try to look at it from what out-of-towners are experiencing, and I can't imagine they were positively impressed by the condition of the MVP. I hope their experiences with local hotels and restaurants were better.

I found it a mixed bag. The starting times were horrible, with the final game not ending until 12:45 or so. The arena is not suited for capacity crowds. The mob scene on the concourse made it difficult or even dangerous to move about. Forget the food lines; I never eat anything in the arena, but the food lines for the trucks outdoors were also horrific with people just jam packing into a swarm. I didn't get anything to eat outdoors either. Then the mob scene trying to get back in for the evening session which was so slow moving many people, including me, missed the start of the game. Part of this problem is the time required for ticket takers to scan mobile tickets. Twice as many ticket takers would have helped. The bathroom Ines were unbelievable One time I found the line extending out the bathroom, up the stairs, and nearly down to the merchandise table. I wound up having to go during the games to avoid the bad line. I can't blame people for complaining about any or all of these and I'm not surprised to hear UConn fans were blasting the arena. I don't like their team anyway.

The actual game experience was fun. The new scoreboard is terrific. How did they get it installed so quickly? The auxiliary scoreboards on the end zones were all an impressive addition. It was great having the Live Look-In feature so we could be part of Kennesaw State's near upset and then the FDU win, But why did they have to terminate that feed when the live game re-started? They had used a split screen previously. I noticed that when there was less than 1 minute remaining the big scoreboard stopped showing the time remaining.

One final note. I parked in P-3 lot and used the walkway. On the way back to my car the lights went out in the walkway leaving only ambient light to reach the Plaza level.

I have to agree with those who think this could be the final time in Albany.

[gorvy]

Glad I'm not the only one sour on the arena. It can't hold 15,000, especially when 90% of the clients are male. I don't remember it being this bad in 2003. Luckily I'm a pro at using the arena so I didn't experience a lot of the problems mentioned here, but the average fan had to be frustrated. The times are what they are, even if we got the first slot it wouldn't have ended till 10:30 and that wouldn't be fair to west coast venues. I've seen better games too but overall I'd still attend if they had it in Albany again.

[frank85]

All valid points, but it doesn’t stop us from enjoying great atmosphere and basketball. As someone previously posted, the NCAA set the TV schedule after Rd 1.

Never eat yellow snow or MVP arena food.

[$cott]

As to the food, I think there are two sets of people, those that go to a game to get arena food and those that will never eat arena food. So 99% of the time it makes sense for the concession stands to cater to the first group. I remember they used to have the TASTENY stand at the games and no one ever ordered from them. I bet that TASTENY would have made a killing yesterday when you essentially forced the second group into eating arena food with the four games in a row.

[gosaints]

Mar 18, 2023 16:33:36 GMT -5 james said:

My seat was also broken and noticed coming up from the bathrooms the entire floor area is in need of a pressure washing but thought the games were excellent!

Did anyone notice the condition of the large American flag (upper level) hanging at the end of the arena? I tried to get them to clean it but no MVP staff seemed to be interested/care!!!! Very, very sad.