Arena #172: Schoenecker Arena - St. Thomas vs. Crown College

Having previously visited the only Division I college basketball venue in the state of Minnesota (Williams Arena - University of Minnesota), I can't say I was thrilled to see the University of St. Thomas decide to transition to Division I for the 2020-21 season since it meant I needed to make a return trip to Minnesota to re-complete the state.  St. Thomas, located in St. Paul, MN, made the extremely rare double division jump in going from Division III all the way up to Division I because they basically outgrew and outspent their former Division III home.  Going into this game, I had no idea what to expect from the campus or the arena given the arena is the same as it was when they played in Division III and, honestly, I didn't expect much from the game itself either since this was another unfortunate non-D1 matchup as the Tommies hosted the Crown College Polars in this contest.

The arena itself surprised me as it was pretty decent for a low major D1 school, which means it probably was an incredible venue for a Division III school.  Schoenecker Arena is located in the middle of the St. Thomas campus and holds approximately 1,800 fans, though there was certainly not a capacity crowd on this frigid December evening.  While most of the venue has general admission bench seats, there are a few sideline sections that offer chairbacks, though at $35 each for a non-D1 game, these sections were unsurprisingly sparsely populated for this game.  Additionally, while the student section isn't very large, there were a few dozen students who were pretty into the game, which certainly helped to make the atmosphere of the game better than expected for a game that expectedly turned into a blowout pretty quickly.

Pregame at Scheonecker Arena

Opening tip between the Tommies and the Polars

It was pretty impressive to think St. Thomas absolutely crushed a team that just 2 years ago would have been in the same division as them.  It wouldn't surprise me to see St. Thomas become fairly competitive in the Summit League over the next couple years and even challenge for a conference tournament title before their Division I transition period ends a la Bellarmine in 2021-22.

Tommies attempting a 3-pointer

Arena #148: Williams Arena - Minnesota vs. DePaul

Living in Wisconsin, it’s hard to believe it’s taken until Arena #148 to make a visit to Williams Arena (aka The Barn) in Minneapolis for a game, but given the University of Minnesota is the only Division 1 program in the state, I needed something more than just 1 game to make the drive up.  A top 12 rivalry matchup on the gridiron between the Golden Gophers and the Wisconsin Badgers for Paul Bunyan’s Axe and a spot in the B1G championship game seemed a great occasion for just such a trip when the schedule worked out perfectly by having a mid-afternoon Black Friday basketball game with the football game on Saturday afternoon.  Turns out the basketball game ended up being a much more exciting matchup than expected in the preseason as the DePaul Blue Demons headed up from Chicago to the Barn with an undefeated record.  Before talking about the game, let’s talk about the Barn and it’s “uniqueness.”  Given the arena was built in the 1920’s, it certainly has some interesting design features such as having to walk through the stands on the first level to reach the upper level seats, but it’s most well-known unique feature is obviously the elevated court.  The Final Four uses a similar layout now each year since it’s played in a football stadium, but seeing it in a much smaller venue like Williams Arena is even more interesting.  Onto the game, DePaul was extremely impressive throughout the contest led by Charlie Moore dropping dimes all over the court and Jalen Coleman-Lands making timely 3s to fend off a huge day in the paint from Minnesota’s center Daniel Oturu who put up 19 points and 18 boards in a losing effort.

Historic Williams Arena aka "The Barn"

Pregame view of the elevated court from the upper level

Gophers attacking the basket in the first half

Jalen Coleman-Lands from DePaul for 3 late in the contest