West Coast Conference Negotiating to Keep Hoops Tourney in Las Vegas
By ALAN SNEL
LVSportsBiz.com
The West Coast Conference is staging its 11th basketball tournament in Las Vegas in March and hopes to stay at the Orleans Arena for more years as the WCC negotiates with the arena’s managers.
The WCC is one of four college basketball conferences that hold their tourneys in Las Vegas in March.
WCC Commissioner Gloria Nevarez hopes to wrap up a deal with the Orleans Arena once she finishes broadcast rights negotiations with ESPN.
Nevarez, hired as commish in April, said the Orleans Arena is an ideal venue for the West Coast Conference hoops tourney and Las Vegas is a central location for the conference’s teams that range from powerhouse Gonzaga to BYU to San Diego. LVSportsBiz.com caught up with Nezarez at a WCC basketball media day at the Orleans Arena Thursday.
To stage its annual hoops tourney in Las Vegas, the West Coast Conferences receives $300,000 a year from Las Vegas Events, the non-profit events promotion arm of the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority (LVCVA).
The WCC three-year deal with Orleans Arena expires in March. Nevarez noted she was part of the Pac-12 conference when that conference decided to hold its basketball tournament in Las Vegas — so she knows what Las Vegas has to offer as a host sports town.
Typically in March, the WCC stages its tourney at the Orleans Arena and then the Western Athletic Conference arrives at the same venue at the Orleans casino-hotel. Meanwhile, the Mountain West Conference hold its tourney at Thomas & Mack Center, while the Pac-12 schools visit T-Mobile Arena to determine their conference hoops champ.
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Las Vegas’ tourism infrastructure and arenas are well suited to accommodate the several dozen college basketball squads every March. And the three arenas are well managed with strong reputations for moving games along and the teams in and out of the locker rooms.
Las Vegas also helps by paying $500,000 per year for the Mountain West for its basketball tournament, and another $500,000 annually for the Pac-12 basketball tournament.
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