Arena #167: Trask Coliseum - North Carolina-Wilmington vs. Delaware

After the ECU game, it was time to head due south to the University of North Carolina – Wilmington (UNCW) to finish the 2 Division 1 schools on the eastern side of the state.  The UNCW Seahawks were hosting the Delaware Blue Hens in a Colonial Athletic Conference (CAA) game at Trask Coliseum on this evening, which was Arena #167 on Mission 351.  Trask Coliseum was exactly the type of venue I would expect in the CAA, set up to hold maybe 5,000-6,000 people.  On this evening, the building was maybe 70% full, but I was impressed by the student turnout for the game, especially coming from ECU earlier in the day where there were maybe 50 students in a “student section.”  UNCW dedicates the entire lower sideline section behind the team benches to student seating and, on this night, the section was probably 75-80% full and the biggest supporters were loud and boisterous.

The Seahawks came into this game with a 10-20 record while Delaware brought a 20-10 record to the contest so I wasn’t expecting much of a game.  UNCW came out to prove me wrong, however, as they led the Blue Hens throughout most of the first half before Delaware took a 1-point lead into the break with a late run.  Sadly, that competitiveness quickly went away in the second half as Delaware showed why they were 10 games over .500 and UNCW showed why they were 10 games under .500.  Far too many Seahawk turnovers, coupled with solid and consistent Blue Hen offense after the break led to a final margin in the game of 82-65, which wasn’t reflective of how competitive the game was for the first 25 minutes or so.  This stop at UNCW was my ninth different venue in the state of North Carolina, putting me at the halfway point to completing the state on my Mission 351 journey.

Front entrance to Trask Coliseum in Wilmington, NC

Inside the seating area of Trask Coliseum pregame

Opening tip between the Seahawks and Blue Hens

UNCW attacking the basket in the second half

Arena #166: Williams Arena at Minges Coliseum - East Carolina vs. Connecticut

Given that I have 10 or less venues left in Mission 351 that are within driving distance for me, I had to plan more flyaway trips this season than ever before.  On this weekend, it was a fairly short flight over to North Carolina for Saturday doubleheader starting at Arena #166, Williams Arena at Minges Coliseum, on the campus of East Carolina University (ECU) in Greenville, NC.  I have to admit a visit to ECU was pretty low on my list of schools in North Carolina, but it became much more important to make this stop this season when Connecticut announced they were leaving The American and returning to the Big East.  As such, the schedule worked out perfect when UConn was slotted to play the ECU Pirates on a late February Saturday afternoon.

Driving up to the arena, which is located right next to the school’s football stadium, gave me hope that the building was going to be nicer than I had in my mind not having really seen any ECU games on TV in the past.  After walking in, I quickly found out that wasn’t really the case as the concourses were small and cramped and the seating bowl relatively old.  Most impressive, however, was the fact that the concession stands sold two different sizes of souvenir cups…one of the three key items I try to collect from every game I attend and the one item that is usually not present in smaller, more obscure venues like ECU.  Williams Arena holds probably 8,000 folks or so and it was maybe half full at best on this day.  I can’t say I was surprised by the small turnout given UConn and ECU aren’t exactly natural rivals, nor do they have recent basketball pedigrees that are anywhere near comparable.  I was impressed, however, how many UConn fans there were in the building, which was great to see given UConn was having a little less success this season than hoped.

On this day, though, UConn would give one of their best performances in recent memory, especially on the road.  The Huskies got off to a quick start building a double-digit lead behind some surprisingly hot 3-point shooting and solid defense on ECU’s best player, Sophomore Jayden Gardner.  UConn held the lead throughout the first half and took a 12-point lead into the break.  There were a few runs back and forth where ECU managed to trim the lead early in the second half, but UConn punched back and stemmed the tide in those runs quite well for being on the road.  Ultimately, the Huskies took a 84-63 win home on this day to get back to .500 in the conference for the first time this season led by a big 27-point outing from Senior guard Christian Vital and a 19-point performance from breakout Freshman guard James Bouknight.

Outside view of Minges Coliseum in Greenville, NC

Inside Williams Arena at Minges Coliseum

Opening tip between the Pirates and Huskies

Some pick and roll action from UConn's Josh Carlton and James Bouknight

Arena #153 - Greensboro Coliseum: North Carolina-Greensboro vs. Mercer

After spending the afternoon at VMI, I headed another 3 hours south to Greensboro, NC for a nightcap at the Greensboro Coliseum for Arena #153.  This game featured a Southern Conference matchup between the UNC-Greensboro Spartans and the Mercer Bears.  The Greensboro Coliseum is a famous venue for college basketball hosting numerous Atlantic Coast Conference and NCAA tournaments and even serves as the home of the ACC Hall of Champions.  It definitely has the look and feel of a major conference venue, but on a regular basis serves as the home court for the UNC-Greensboro men’s basketball team.  Maybe this makes sense when the students are in session, but on this day I spent the majority of the game trying to understand why this game was being played in the Coliseum with a capacity of over 20,000 people when there were maybe 3,000-4,000 folks in attendance.  It was obvious they weren’t expecting much for attendance either when there was only 1 concession stand open on each end of the arena.  The Spartans absolutely dominated the first half of this game taking an 18 point lead into the break before Mercer turned around and dominated the first 10+ minutes of the second half in cutting that 18 point lead down to 4.  The game stayed tight throughout the remainder of the game, but UNC-Greensboro never ended up giving up the lead and eventually took home a 9-point conference win.

Exterior view of the Greensboro Coliseum

Not exactly a robust crowd in the cavernous Greensboro Coliseum for this contest

Pregame video and introductions for the home Spartans

UNCG with the runner as they try to maintain their lead in the second half

Arena #130: Holmes Convocation Center - Appalachian St. vs. Milligan

To complete the doubleheader for the day, we drove back to North Carolina and up through the Appalachians to Appalachian St. University for a matchup with NAIA school Milligan College.  I guess from the name of the school, I should have expected it might be a little cold outside at Appalachian St., but I certainly didn’t expect sub 40 degree temperatures on a cold, rainy night in Boone, NC.  Plus the half mile walk up and down a few hundred feet from the parking lot to the arena certainly didn’t help the enjoyment factor either  Given the weather and the fact this game was played a few days before the Christmas holiday with no students on campus, the attendance for this matchup was quite sparse creating very little atmosphere for this contest.  Even as a severely outmatched team, Milligan managed to keep the game close and relatively exciting up until halftime.  After the break, the Mountaineers imposed their will on both ends of the court scoring nearly 60 points after the break in a dominant half of basketball!

Sparse crowd on hand in the mountains of Boone, NC for this pre-holiday contest

"APP" flags leading the players out onto the court

Opening tip of the matchup between Appalachian St. and Milligan

App St. with a second half throwdown!

Arena #128: PNC Arena - North Carolina St. vs. #7 Auburn

After spending the day with about 400 people at USC Upstate it was off to Raleigh for a nightcap at the PNC Arena that North Carolina St. shares with the NHL’s Carolina Hurricanes and a crowd of probably 15,000+ who were there to cheer on their Wolfpack to an upset of the 7^th ranked Auburn Tigers.  PNC Arena is located a bit off by itself right off the interstate in the western city limits of Raleigh, which makes for a bit of a subpar external atmosphere with all the parking lots that surround the building.  However, the inside of the building is pretty nice as expected given it houses a pro hockey team as well as Wolfpack sports.  The biggest disappointment for sure though was no souvenir cups in a power 5 conference venue!  As for the game itself, for as high octane of an offense that Auburn showed during the early part of their non-conference season in moving into the top 10 of the national rankings, they simply could not get anything going on this night in Raleigh.  NC State held the Auburn three-point shooters in check most of the night and hit some timely threes of their own to pull off the upset in this matchup.

Inside the expansive PNC Arena - home of the NC State Wolfpack

Opening tip between the Wolfpack and the #7 Tigers

Auburn coach, Bruce Pearl, getting fired up (and T'd up) on the sideline in the first half 

Auburn taking it to the rack for a slam

Arena #126: Gore Arena - Campbell vs. The Citadel

I couldn’t have been much more excited for our visit to Gore Arena, Arena #126, on the campus of Campbell University, not because I expected a particularly good game, but because Campbell has one of the best mascots in all of collegiate sports, the Fighting Camel!  Nothing like seeing a giant bronze statue of a camel in front of the arena to get you excited for a hoops game 😊.  Gore Arena must be fairly new and parts of it were classed up, but the plastic seats might have been some of the most uncomfortable I’ve experienced in my Mission 351 travels to date.  Additionally, being holiday break here at Campbell just like the earlier games on this trip, the student section was sparse, but I was pleased by the turn out from the remainder of the fan base as the arena was probably close to half full, including a good number of fans cheering for the opposing Citadel Bulldogs.  Plus, it was a fun chance to watch the current career scoring leader in NCAA D1, Chris Clemons, play in person.  Clemons, who would surpass 3,000 career points later in the season, certainly had a green light to shoot whenever and wherever.  However, his offense wasn’t enough to overcome a balanced Bulldogs attack throughout the evening to where The Citadel took home a victory over the Fighting Camels in this one.

The giant bronze fightin' camel out front of Gore Arena

Inside of Gore Arena

Opening tip between the Fightin' Camels and the Bulldogs

3,000 point career scorer, Chris Clemons, making one of his many trips to the free throw line

Arena #125: Lawrence Joel Veterans Memorial Coliseum - Wake Forest vs. Davidson

Night three of our North Carolina trip took us over to Winston-Salem for an intra-state matchup between the Wake Forest Demon Deacons and the Davidson Wildcats from Arena #125, the Lawrence Joel Veterans Memorial Coliseum.  Now normally I would have expected this to be a pretty hot ticket given the expectations for Davidson in 2018-19, but Wake has been pretty subpar the last couple years and with the students still on break, the arena wasn’t too packed or boisterous for this one.  Davidson definitely didn’t bring their best game to this contest, though being without one of their best players in Kellan Grady didn’t help.  Wake controlled the tempo and the scoreboard throughout the game and pulled off a 4 point win in what had to be considered an upset of one of the favorites to win the Atlantic 10 for the 2018-19 season.

Holy bollards outside the Lawrence Joel Veterans Memorial Coliseum in Winston-Salem, NC

Not the most exciting court design anymore (definitely miss having the Deacon at mid-court)

Opening tip between the Demon Deacons and the Wildcats

Davidson head coach Bob McKillop having a conversation with Teddy Valentine on the sideline

Arena #124: Schar Center - Elon vs. Canisius

After spending the prior evening in a crowd of over 20,000 in Chapel Hill, it was quite the change to spend Sunday afternoon in front of a crowd of maybe 600 or 700 folks at the brand new Schar Center at Elon University.  Elon is another stunningly built campus in the South just like prior stops at places like Liberty and Belmont where you can tell the tens of thousands of dollars these students pay in tuition are definitely being invested in the campus.  While the building and arena itself were beautiful from having been just constructed, the crowd left something to be desired, though I understand it was a Sunday afternoon game against a team from a thousand miles away with the students on winter break.  The few people that were at this game, though, were treated to an outstanding, back-and-forth contest between the home Phoenix and the visiting Canisius Golden Griffins (holy mythical birds in this one!).  Elon took the lead into halftime, but the Golden Griffins played just better enough in the second half to pull out a 1 point win in the final possessions.

The beautiful new Schar Center on the Elon University campus

Perfect sized seating area for a team like Elon, though it was sparsely populated for today's game

Opening tip between the Phoenix and the Golden Griffins

Canisius attacking the basket with a strong contest by an Elon defender

Arena #123: Dean E. Smith Center - #12 North Carolina vs. #4 Gonzaga

After an early afternoon stop at Liberty, it was off to Arena #123, the Dean E. Smith Center on the campus of the University of North Carolina for the lynchpin game of this trip, a top 15 matchup between Gonzaga and UNC. While the Smith Center is a surprisingly non-descript facility on the outside, you can’t help but to be in awe of the history and legacy of the UNC program when you look up into the rafters in the Carolina blue colored seating bowl and see jerseys from Jordan and Jamison to Worthy and Carter. For a non-conference game, the crowd was at capacity and the students were rocking for this one as the Heels were hosting a Gonzaga program that suffered their first defeat of the season in Phoenix the prior weekend to the top 5 Tennessee Volunteers. This was definitely one of the most entertaining, yet sloppy games of basketball I’ve ever seen live in my 123 stops to date. Let’s just say the shot clock never became an issue in this contest with both teams running and gunning throughout. At the end of the day, the Zags left too much of their defense back in Spokane as the Heels hung over 100 points on them in this one, yet drawing the loudest ovation of the night when the 100 point mark was eclipsed meaning the crowd won a free Bojangles biscuit! Gotta love the South!

The Dean E. Smith Center certainly doesn't have much in the way of exterior styling

Inside the seating bowl of the Smith Center...whole lotta Carolina blue everywhere...

So many jerseys hanging from the rafters in Chapel Hill

Opening tip between the Bulldogs and the Tar Heels in front of a raucous crowd

Rui Hachimura of Gonzaga with the emphatic dunk

Arena #92: Maples Pavilion - Stanford vs. #9 North Carolina

The final stop of 6 games in 6 days in NorCal to once again see North Carolina play, this time on the road against the Stanford Cardinal.  For someone who isn't a fan of UNC, it's ridiculous to think this was the 7th game I've seen of theirs in the last year after a matchup at the University of Hawai'i, 3 at the 2016 Maui Jim Maui Invitational, and 2 more at the 2017 Final Four.  Sadly, I'm beginning to think I'm a good luck charm for good 'ol Roy and team as they won every one of those 6 previous games.

As for Maples Pavilion and this game, the matchup was not nearly as competitive as I hoped for as UNC blew out the Cardinal and Maples Pavilion was significantly less interesting and unique than I expected.  

Opening tip of Stanford vs. #9 North Carolina

Stanford taking it to the rack

Strong crowd, including a lot of powder blue, to see a top 10 opponent at Maples

2017 NCAA Final Four - University of Phoenix Stadium, Glendale, AZ

April 1 & 3, 2017: 8 years ago I went to the Final Four for the first time thinking it might be a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to watch my UConn Huskies in person in Detroit.  Fast forward to 2017 and I had the opportunity to go to my 4th Final Four, but for the first time it wasn't in support of UConn.  Instead, I got to cheer for my other favorite team, the Gonzaga Bulldogs, who finally busted through their proverbial NCAA ceiling to reach the Final Four for the first time.  After 2 exciting semifinal games between Gonzaga and fellow first time Final Four participant South Carolina as well as Oregon and North Carolina on Saturday evening, the stage was set for a Monday night showdown between one of the bluest of college basketball's bluebloods in North Carolina and a Gonzaga program that very few knew even played D1 basketball less than 20 years ago.  While the outcome of the game didn't turn out as I hoped since the refs utterly mucked the game up after halftime, it was still another memorable visit to one of the greatest annual sporting events in the country!

Sunny and 80 degrees outside U PHX Stadium on Championship Day!

Court looks pretty small in a cavernous stadium doesn't it?

Glad my seats weren't up there!

Coach Few and Coach Williams with a pregame greeting

Opening tip of the National Championship!

Nigel Williams-Goss from Gonzaga with the baseline jumper

Williams-Goss pulls up over UNC's Theo Pinson

The confetti flies for the 2017 National Champions - North Carolina