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Stadium: WVU Coliseum
The WVU Coliseum is a 14,000-seat multi-purpose arena near the Evansdale campus of West Virginia University in Morgantown, West Virginia. The circular arena features a poured concrete roof.
The arena, which opened in 1970, is home to the WVU Mountaineers men's and women's basketball teams, men's wresting, as well as WVU's women's teams in volleyball and gymnastics. The arena has nearly 100 offices, 13 lecture and seminar rooms, a dance studio, safety lab, racquetball and squash courts, Jerry West Mountaineer Room (holds nearly 150 people for meetings). Comprises more than 10.5 million cubic feet of space. The arena also has more than 1,000 individual locker units in various dressing rooms available for students and staff. There is also a 3,000 square foot weight room located in the lower level of the Coliseum. The arena has been used for concerts but the concrete roof has poor sound distribution properties, so other venues in nearby towns are more appropriate for this purpose. The poor sound quality was purposeful, as it was the intention of the designers to cup the ceiling so that crowd noise generated at basketball games would be directed back to the floor. The first event held at the Coliseum in 1970 was a Grand Funk Railroad concert. The arena hosted the 1984 and 1988 Atlantic Ten Conference men's basketball tournaments.
Team History:
West Virginia men's basketball has competed in three basketball championship final matches: the 1959 NCAA final, the 1942 NIT final (at that time, the NIT was considered by many to be more prestigious than the NCAA), and the 2007 NIT Championship. They lost 71-70 to California in the 1959 final NCAA finals, while the Mountaineers won the 1942 NIT Championship by 47-45 over Western Kentucky and the 2007 NIT contest over Clemson 78-73, in what was supposed to be a rebuilding season.
The most points scored in a game was 132 points against Alaska-Fairbanks in 1994, while the largest margin of victory was against Salem College, with the Mountaineers winning 113-32 in 1945. The largest margin of defeat in Mountaineer basketball history came in 1978 against Louisville, when the Cardinals beat the Mountaineers 106-60.
Season Preview:
Good news: Coach Bob Huggins knows how to win and will win in Morgantown. Darris Nichols, Alex Ruoff and Joe Alexander return to give Huggins a group of players who understand what it takes to win in the Big East.
Bad news: Those who believe that Huggins cannot win with players recruited to play under former coach John Beilein's "system" will have to eat crow. This team won't win the Big East, but it won't be in the basement either.
Official Site:
msnsportsnet.com