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I've heard some info that I thought I would pass along to those who are interested:

The Farris Center, for lack of a better term, is experiencing a makeover of sorts. All of the banners that were hanging from the rafters have been removed. Several of the banners were in excess of 30 years old and were looking pretty bad. They want to do some sort of banner, however, to recognize the conference, district, regional championships, etc. in both mens and womens basketball...it just hasn't been determined at this point how that will be done. The banners have been replaced with five HUGE Scottie Pippen banners.

Don't when this is going to be done, but there is a plan to put a curtain on the east and west sides of the Farris Center in an attempt tomake the arena more intimate and give a feel of the crowd being closer to the floor. I understand the curtain will be about half way up into stands on each side.

Are you saying they intend to use a curtain to partition off the upper parts of the seating area on both sides? Are they trying to hide empty seats, or.... what, I wonder?

Will this be done only during the men's games?

I would think hiding empty seats and forcing people to sit closer together and to the floor.

I think it is a great idea! I like closer and having a more intimate feeling. Having a lot of empty seats is never a good thing.

I would like to point out that not one of the huge Pippen banners features UCA's most iconic basketball player wearin a UCA uniform. All the photos are of him in a Bulls or a USA uniform. What about the famous pic of him dunking in the Farris Center?

maybe there's a lack of hi-resolution image of him in a UCA uniform. You need a pretty high-quality shot for something that is blown up that big and not have it look horrible.

I like a winning program and a lot of fans in the stands for intimacy. This curtain deal gives the appearance that we are settling for a mediocre program. And some people are wanting to spend money on a new facility?

A curtain goes up right away. A winning program can't be put in there overnight. When the need is there for more seats, you raise the curtain. In the meantime, at least this way you don't have people spread out so much and sitting so far away from the action.

I don't think it's settling for mediocrity, but taking a step to improve the game atmosphere – which you hope leads to more wins, more fans, impressing recruits and taking a step toward something above mediocrity.

But if shrinking the arena is, by your logic, settling for a mediocre program, then I guess the right signal would be to go build a 12,000-seat arena?

If you're responding to me what the hell are you talking about?

I am talking about that, if you see tightening up the arena and making it more intimate and appearing smaller while attendance is in the dumps is "settling for mediocrity", then what would be the opposite?

I would assume you would want to go the opposite direction of settling for mediocrity, and if blocking off seats = settling for mediocrity, then the opposite of that would be to add seats. That's pretty clear. Are you not a proponent of doing that? If so – in regards to seats – what would be your answer? What would be the right step that sends the message that mediocrity is not being settled for?

Basically I'm saying that I just don't see how trying to change the arena environment is settling for mediocrity.

Ok, I see what you mean. I'm interpreting the curtain thing as a quick fix for the immediate future to bring a better game environment from most of you. Which, that might well work but I don't think so. Maybe it's what's going on behind the curtain that is the problem.