ARCO Arena

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ARCO Arena
Image:ARCOArenalogo.gif
Arco Arena
Location One Sports Parkway, Sacramento, California 95834
Broke ground 1987
Opened 1988
Owner The Maloof family
Operator The Maloof family
Construction cost $40 million USD
Architect Rann Haight
Tenants Sacramento Kings (NBA) (1988-present)
Sacramento Monarchs (WNBA) (1997-present)
Sacramento Attack (AFL) (1992)
Sacramento Knights (CISL - WISL) (1993-2001)
Capacity Basketball: 17,317

Indoor Soccer 10,632

ARCO Arena is an indoor arena located in Sacramento, California, United States. After playing in the make-shift facility called the Original ARCO Arena, this version was completed in 1988, at a cost of $40 million — entirely privately financed.

It is home to the NBA's Sacramento Kings and the WNBA's Sacramento Monarchs. The arena seats 17,317 for basketball, and has 30 luxury suites and 412 club seats. The arena has been noted for its loud character and continual at-capacity crowds, which, combined with wood floors, make it a tough environment for visiting teams; the Kings only sold out 3 home games in the 2007-2008 season and averaged 13,500 per game.

There was another sports venue with that exact same name, which was known as the original ARCO Arena (1985-1988), where the Kings played their home games for three seasons (1985 to 1988), after moving from Kansas City. It had a capacity of 10,333 seats.

The Sacramento Kings playing the Charlotte Bobcats.
The Sacramento Kings playing the Charlotte Bobcats.

There had recently been a campaign by the Maloof family to build a new $600 million facility in Sacramento, which was to be funded by a quarter cent sales tax increase over 15 years. In 2006, voters overwhelmingly rejected ballot measures Q and R[1], leading to the NBA publicly calling for a new arena to be built at another well-known Sacramento facility, Cal Expo, the site of California's state fair.[2]

ARCO Arena is located in a once isolated area on the expanding northern outskirts of the city. It was constructed at a cost of just $40 million, the lowest of any venue in the NBA. It is the smallest arena in the NBA by size and third smallest by seating capacity (17,317). Only KeyArena in Seattle (17,072) and Orlando's Amway Arena (17,248) have smaller seating capacities.

The namesake sponsor of the arena, energy company ARCO, has had corporate sponsorship since the arena's inception as well as the original ARCO Arena. On March 19, 2007, the Maloof brothers announced a multi-year agreement extension of the naming rights of ARCO Arena [1].

[edit] Notable Events

[edit] Trivia

  • A partially built baseball stadium is located on the northern end of the arena. Financing for the stadium fell through, and eventually was abandoned. The construction of Raley Field dashed hopes of finishing the project, however there have been talks of converting this location to a soccer stadium.
  • ARCO Arena set a Guinness World Record for loudest sports roar by reaching over 130 decibels on November 8, 2006 during a Kings game against the Detroit Pistons.
  • On January 20, 1996, there was one of the oddest occurrences to ever happen during a basketball game. A fan placed a 7 month old baby girl, who was nude, in the middle of the court during a Sacramento Kings game at halftime and proceeded to spin her around in circles. The man was arrested and his estranged wife did not press charges. According to news reporter Chris Bradshaw, it was the "most disturbing thing I have ever seen in my life." The game went on as planned, but Bradshaw dubbed it as, "The oddest thing to ever happen during a basketball game in the history of the sport."[citation needed]
  • There is a song called "Arco Arena" on the album Comfort Eagle by Sacramento band Cake. It is an instrumental.

[edit] External links

  1. ^ Kelly Johnson. "Railyard arena backers will keep trying", Sacramento Business Journal, 2006-11-08. Retrieved on 2008-04-22. 
  2. ^ Kelly Johnson. "Cal Expo board agrees to consider arena, mixed-use project", Sacramento Business Journal, 2007-09-21. Retrieved on 2008-04-22. 
Preceded by
ARCO Arena (First)		 Home of the
Sacramento Kings
1988 – present		 Succeeded by
current

Coordinates: 38°38′56.52″N, 121°31′4.73″W

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