They have a totally custom SEC tournament color scheme and logos on the floor. Is that a brand new floor or did they strip and sand clean the existing floor and then had the custom paint job installed? Will that get re-done immediately after the tournament so they can host March Madness games there?
It seems like they do custom jobs on some of the floors in the big tourney so maybe this is not that rare. You only get 4-5 sand jobs on a floor before you get to the tongue and groove nail heads.
Most of these places have separate floors. I know the NCAA orders floors for each tournament site every year. And Nashville hosts the SECT enough that it’s worth having the floor on hand.
Then after the tournament they sell them at a discount so schools can get an almost new floor cheap and paint their own colors and logos.
I think lots of short term venues are created for just a short event then sold off. For some reason I think I remember hearing that is how we came by our world class indoor track.
Originally, yes. I think it was created for the World Indoors in Toronto or somewhere and we bought it when Tyson Center was built. Pretty sure it’s been replaced since then.
When BWA was built there was a lot of talk about the flooring (and sub-flooring?). It was said it offered more cushioning, and/or would somehow reduce wear and tear on players joints. Did it? Is it still the same? Did other courts adopt this “new technology” or was it over-hyped.
BWA is a permanent floor; it can’t be removed, stored and replaced. These are all temporary floors, assembled like a jigsaw puzzle. I think they did have to put in a whole new floor at BWA after some flooding in 2013 (which was before we had a practice facility).
But I do recall reading about some extra spring in the BWA floor when it was new.
Yes, “spring” as opposed to “cushion” which I mistakenly called it.
Connor Sports, the company that makes the portable floors for the NCAA (as well as multiple NBA teams), also makes permanent floors. Their website touts “premium athlete comfort” and “multi-athlete resilience” for their permanent surfaces. Do either one of those mean the spring we’re talking about? Beats me.
But then again, their portable floors also tout “premium athlete comfort.” May all just be marketing mumbojumbo.
thought Bud Walton got a brand new floor a few years ago when they named it Richardson Court and put the image of the state at center court or did i dream that?
I think that was just a new paint job.
There is a 1/4" thick resilient pad under wood floors that give it the “cushion” while maintaining the firm support to give a consistent bounce to the ball. Sometimes floors, as they age, bow up so that they are floating above the concrete with a space under the pads. That becomes a “dead spot” in the floor that causes the ball to suddenly not bounce back up correctly and really messes up the dribbler. The wood itself bends very slightly to let the pad do its flexing. Too much cushioning is just as bad as too little.
Speaking of the floor, Joseph Goodman, an al.com sports reporter, wrote this:
“The refs kept pausing the game every time Moore would play a few minutes. He was dripping blood all over the parquet.”
Joseph needs a lesson in hardwood floors.
There used to be a bargain basement gym floor that had 3/8" thick 12x12 maple wood “tiles” laid in a parquet pattern and glued to a double layer of plywood with the cushion pads underneath. The theory was that 3/8" of wood is about all you have above the top of the nails on a regular gym floor so you just buy 3/8" of maple and save money with plywood underneath it. No one liked it and it went away years ago.