A few years ago, I went to Georgia State to see them at their cozy on-campus gym known as the GSU Sports Arena, which was in its last season as a basketball venue. In 2022, they moved to a new, much larger facility known as the Georgia State University Convocation Center, where the university would hold graduation ceremonies. It took three seasons for the schedule to work out, during which time I actually saw a volleyball game at the Sports Arena, but I finally had the chance to visit their new digs on this trip.
The building is located at the corner of Fulton Street and Hank Aaron Drive, right next to the Olympic Cauldron (above) and a couple of blocks away from Center Parc Stadium (formerly Turner Field), which is now Georgia State's gridiron (below). You even walk by the footprint of Fulton County Stadium, where Hank Aaron hit #715 and the Blue Jays won their first World Series. This area is part of the Summerhill neighborhood and there are plenty of eateries to enjoy before or after the game, with Halfway Crooks a popular choice for beer drinkers. If you are taking transit, the nearest MARTA stop is still Georgia State, though Garnett is more convenient if coming from the airport. The walk back at night can be a bit sketchy if you are not used to it as the area is rather empty, so take a rideshare if you don't have a car. If you are driving, there is parking in the lot right next to the stadium.
The box office is in the southeast corner of the rectangular structure, and tickets are $10. I was asked to give my cell number for the ticket to be texted but I asked for a hard stub and was handed a ticket that had already been printed. Why waste the paper and then ask for my phone number? Just distribute the tickets and make things easier for everyone.
Inside the entrance is a very spacious concourse as you would expect for a venue that can hold 7,500 for basketball and even more for convocation exercises. This is almost double the 3,854 that could fit into the Sports Arena.
There are several concession stands, though prices are not as friendly as they were at the Arena; a bottle of soda is now $6 while a can was just a buck when I visited in 2021. The school has its own beer from Wild Leap called Golden Panther, a sign of how far things have come in terms of normalizing alcohol use with college kids. Not that it wasn't normal before, but athletics venues were often the exception, even just a decade ago. Revenue is revenue, I guess.
There isn't much around the concourse other than an artwork that shows mortarboards (graduation caps) that have been decorated by those receiving their diplomas. It is pretty cool and unique among places I have visited.
A few monitors showing the game are also on the concourse; the one below had yet to update the visiting team after a women's game was played beforehand.
There are two levels of seats, with the upper bowl in a horseshoe at the far end where two scoreboards are located. As such, sitting under here in the student section would make it impossible to see the scoreboards.
Below is a view from the concourse behind the student section and the band. As you can see, no scoreboards in view.
The upper bowl is open although few fans bother to sit here. Attendance was 2,752, so I was able to move around easily and sat in a variety of locations.
At one end of the lower bowl, the seats are rolled up and a private party area takes its place. In a sense, this creates an opposite horseshoe effect, with the open ends on opposite sides of the court.
Below is a view from the first row of seats just above the party area and you can see the two scoreboards in the distance. The one on the left includes player stats while the one on the right shows just video.
Banners and retired numbers have been updated from those that were on the walls at the Sports Arena. I expect R.J. Hunter to be added to the list below in the near future.
The mascot is Pounce the Panther, who wears some cool overalls over his basketball uniform.
The shot below gives a good idea of the layout of the court and the seating bowls, which are separate in the lower level for flexibility when graduation events are held.
Overall, GSUCC is certainly an improvement over the Sports Arena, though I prefer the smaller and cheaper venue. But progress is progress and I expect that most fans and athletes are happy to have this new gym to call home.
The Game
Old Dominion (6-11 in the Sun Belt) was visiting for the final regular season game, while the Panthers were 7-10. The two had met just two weeks earlier in Norfolk, with the Monarchs winning 78-55, but they were only 1.5-point favourites on this evening. The Monarchs were sporting their sweet powder blue alternate uniforms.
The first half was a back-and-forth affair with six ties and five lead changes. Knotted at 31, Georgia State's Malachi Brown stole the ball on consecutive possessions and assisted on dunks both times; on the next Monarch possession, Joah Chappelle stole the ball and assisted on a Brown jumper. That 6-point edge held on to the half with the Panthers up 42-36. There were 17 fouls in the half, and man, I wish that would have been the case in the second half too.
Old Dominion wasted little time in coming back to tie the game and used a 13-4 run to take a 60-54 lead at the midway point of the period. Then they committed four fouls in 26 seconds and that started a string of 24 infractions over the final 10 minutes of the game. What had been a decent affair became completely unwatchable; every possession seemed to be a foul. Both teams were in the double bonus with 8 minutes to go and I basically stopped paying attention.
Georgia State got within a pair at 72-70 with 2:40 left after an Anthony Enoh dunk, but they could not capitalize on their next possession, missing two key shots and allowing ODU to score five points over two minutes that essentially clinched the game. A few free throws down the stretch made the final 81-73 for the visitors. After Enoh's dunk, the Panthers missed five meaningful shots and that cost them the game. Going 3-20 from long range didn't help either.
There were 51 fouls (34 in the second half!) and 64 free throws in just 40 minutes. I would expect a lot of frustrated fans, but my fellow attendees didn't seem to mind, perhaps because they were glued to their phones. Whatever the case, I decided to see a baseball game the following day as I'm getting tired of zealous zebras, as I do at the end of every basketball season.
Notes
This was my 326th basketball venue, exactly double the 163 hockey rinks I have seen. For a Canadian, that's pretty embarrassing.
The teams finished tied at 7-11 with ODU getting the 11th seed in the Sun Belt tournament, while Georgia State was 13th. Both teams were eliminated early and should not see any other postseason action.
Best,
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