NBA Arena Showcase: AT&T Center In San Antonio
Wednesday night, the San Antonio Spurs evened up their second round Western Conference playoff series with the Houston Rockets, after a resounding 121-96 victory in Game 2. The Spurs bounced back from a 126-99 walloping from the Rockets on Monday.
The best-of-seven now moves to Houston’s Toyota Center, with Game 3 tipping off on Friday night. When considering that these two south Texas based franchises finished with the NBA’s second and third best regular season records, combined with the respective blowouts that came out of the opening two contests, it is interesting to note that betting experts believe that Friday’s matchup is completely up for grabs.
Since 2002, the five-time champion Spurs have played their home games at the 18,000-seat AT&T Center, located in San Antonio’s East Side, three miles straight east of the city’s downtown area. The arena was originally constructed for $186 million, with an additional $101.5 million pumped in, during a 2015 renovation.
The building features 50 luxury suites, with more than 2,000 club seats, including several 12-person courtside boxes. These premium seat holders, along with arena and team sponsors, have access to the SWBC Terrace Club Restaurant, an upscale food and beverage space.
The venue is also home to two separate “Saddles & Spurs” sports bars, “Rock & Brews,” a music and sports themed dining and drinking destination and a Whataburger fast-food station.
For those looking to dine in the concourse, a wide array of concessions are available, including Texas favorites like loaded baked potatoes, brisket and many varieties of nachos.
The Spurs arrived in San Antonio in 1973, as a member club of the old ABA. In 1976, the franchise became a part of the NBA.
From ’73 up until ’93, the organization played home games at HemisFair Arena, located in downtown San Antonio. The team was then housed at the Alamodome (located just outside of downtown) from ’93 through ’02. One of the overarching reasons the team elected to move to its current setting has less to do with basketball and whole lot more to do with rodeo.
AT&T Center sits immediately adjacent to the now 68-year-old Freeman Coliseum, San Antonio’s first-ever large-scale sports arena. Freeman is the former longtime home of the San Antonio Stock Show & Rodeo. Upon the opening of AT&T, the 18-day February extravaganza moved next door to the Spurs current home, with Freeman then becoming the site of the many tradeshows and exhibitions that are an integral part of the event.
Because of the existence of the annual San Antonio Stock Show & Rodeo and regular tour stops of the Professional Bull Riders circuit, the joint AT&T Center/Freeman Coliseum property comes equipped with cattle, swine and horse stalling. No other NBA arena can lay claim to such a distinction.
