Shalom Lansky

September 17th, 2009 at 5:02 PM ^

Practice facility?

If there is a new facility, players will probably go there and you know, practice and . . . work out and uhhh watch film, all violations!

Essentially Michigan is building a palace of sin!

Like the apple in the garden of eden, this advanced practice facility will only serve to lure the Michigan program down the path of evil!

dlanny22

September 17th, 2009 at 5:11 PM ^

I've never understood the draw of a great practice facility to a recruit. Especially when the arena you play the games in is so far from top notch. I think of it in terms of this...It's like asking for an absolutely amazing hand to masturbate with(practice facility) and then getting laid each night with an average woman(Crisler Arena).

goblizzle

September 17th, 2009 at 5:31 PM ^

The fact that M bball will have a state of the art practice facility will be a huge draw to go along with the Glick center because athletes spend probably 80-90% of their time in practice and only 10-20% in competition a season, so it would only make sense to spruce up what they spend a majority of their time in first.

Don't get me wrong I would love for Crisler to be spruced up but I'll take a new practice facility any day.

dlanny22

September 17th, 2009 at 5:43 PM ^

Calling another Michigan fan a troll. That's quite a jump isn't it. You have no idea who I am or what I have done. Perhaps you can go look at other things I have posted.

In fact, I like a lot of your post, even though my personal feelings on a practice facility are different. You want to neg my idea, fine, but the name calling is a little low.

Rashman

September 17th, 2009 at 5:31 PM ^

I think it makes a significant difference to recruits and players because they spend so much time at the practice facility. I would imagine that they spend considerably more time there than they will at Crisler.

To stick with your analogy, they've got a lot more lonely nights so they might as well... aw, nevermind.

me

September 17th, 2009 at 5:33 PM ^

It's a question of how important the basketball program is to the university. If a recruit sees a team that shares practice time with the women's team and the wrestling team, what does that say about the level of dedication of the university? If I was a recruit and I had a choice between a university that actually cared about the program and one appeared not to, I would choose the one that did.

BJNavarre

September 17th, 2009 at 5:44 PM ^

The Men's & Women's basketball team, gymnastic teams and (I think) the wrestling team all use Crisler in some capacity. Crisler is overextended as a facility -- I believe when Crisler is in use by another sport the men's bball team sometimes heads to the IM building for practice. With the practice facility, the Men's and Women's basketball players have a top notch facility that they can use at just about anytime. This is a major improvement over the current situation.

psychomatt

September 17th, 2009 at 6:04 PM ^

First, it is a dedicated facility for men's and women's basketball. Chrisler is shared by many sports so the basketball teams currently need to schedule practice time (mandatory and voluntary) around the many other uses of the facility. Second, it has offices, training, film, and other related facilities to support the basketball programs.

Brodie

September 17th, 2009 at 6:06 PM ^

I'm not entirely sure... my experiences in Crisler have been few, I'm not much of a basketball fan. But I'd think there are always improvements that can be made. Especially with such unlimited architectural resources.

There's currently a plan on the table to turn this arena

into this

without interrupting the ability to use the facility. And for only $150 million. Are you telling me we couldn't do that?

BJNavarre

September 17th, 2009 at 6:15 PM ^

With $150 million dollars you can turn any crappy Arena into gold.

I'm no fan of Crisler, but I don't see what dumping another $5 million dollars into the place would do. I would rather them pocket that money for whenever the time is right to build a new $60-80 million state-of-the-art arena.

jmblue

September 17th, 2009 at 8:18 PM ^

You can't build a state-of-the-art arena for $60-80 million. You'd have to spend double that figure, at least. And then you'd most likely have to build the arena further south, in a still more inaccessible location.

Anyway, Crisler isn't that bad. It doesn't need major structural changes. The lighting and sound, which had been subpar, have been remedied. The main thing the arena needs is just some general touching up - new paint here and there, maybe some new seats, etc. Also, they could use some kind of a walkway that cuts across the athletic campus that makes it easier to reach the arena in the winter. Currently, most fans have to walk around a bunch of buildings, and then through a very large parking lot, before they get inside.

jmblue

September 18th, 2009 at 11:02 AM ^

That was 12 years ago. Given normal inflation, it'd now cost about $110 million in 2009 dollars - but construction costs have risen above the inflation rate, and real estate in Ann Arbor is more costly than it is in Madison. (And again, we'd be forced to build it in a still more inaccessible location, further south than Crisler.)

ish

September 17th, 2009 at 5:58 PM ^

when you have your own place to practice you feel more comfortable and can get more and better work in (note to freep: when i decide to do something on my own that it is called voluntary).

ThaLastProphet

September 17th, 2009 at 8:00 PM ^

WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!

I am seriously elated right now.

A million thank yous to John, Manny, DeShawn, and all the guys for making it so the University had to build one. WOOOO!

aenima0311

September 18th, 2009 at 11:11 AM ^

Chrisler Arena should be a special place where only games are played. To have practice there every day makes being able to play on that court a little less special.

Plus, it means that they can schedule practices at much more sane times, and be a ton more flexable with it. The Men and Women sharing time was a mess for class scheduling, and even eliminated possible majors for recruits. This was clearly the bigger need. Chrisler will get what it needs in due time. They've already make a beavvy of improvements.