This article discusses why LV is a great place for conference tournaments. Here is a part where Hurd talks about LV. Overall its a good article.

Quote:The Western Athletic Conference was one of the first to hold its conference tournament in Las Vegas back when they held it at the Thomas & Mack Center from 1997 to 1999. The Big West Conference became the first when it held its tournament at the Thomas & Mack Center in 1994 and 1995 before moving. The WAC would return to Las Vegas in 2011 and has held its men's and women's basketball tournaments at the Orleans Arena following the WCC tournament ever since.

During a six-day stretch from March 5 to March 10, the WCC, WAC, MWC and Pac-12 held 50 conference tournament games at three different arenas in Las Vegas and crowned seven conference championship teams that earned automatic berths to the NCAA tournament.

"It's a destination city that just meets all the requirements for a conference, teams and fans," said WAC commissioner Jeff Hurd. "The facilities are a factor, and the cost of putting on the tournament is also a big factor. The way that entertainment dollars are spent today, you have to give fans a reason other than a basketball game to come out and try to grow your tournament. Las Vegas offers fans a lot of entertainment options outside of the basketball games, aside from the obvious, from dining to golfing to shows. It's also easy and affordable to get to from just about anywhere. It's really an easy sell for fans."

There are about 170,000 hotel rooms in Las Vegas, which are the most for a city in the United States by about 50,000 rooms. The abundance of rooms means that there are options for just about any price point. There are also five arenas in the city (T-Mobile Arena, Thomas & Mack Center, MGM Grand Garden Arena, Mandalay Bay Events Center and the Orleans Arena) with a 600,000-square-foot, 18,500-seat arena backed by Madison Square Garden opening in 2020. Vegas could easily become the home of six conference tournaments if the Big West (currently held in Anaheim) and Big Sky (Reno) were ever interested in moving.

"There's something for everyone here," Hurd said. "The Orleans is perfect for our conference. We don't need a 20,000-seat arena. This arena seats 9,000, which is perfect for our conference, and the hotel is, quite frankly, less expensive for our fans in terms of rooms and food, and it also costs less for us to operate the event. It's just a perfect set-up."

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I've always been a big fan of Las Vegas (and even Reno for the Big Sky for the 3 years) for tournaments, there isn't many other big cities that can compete.

I don't know why the Big West doesn't move their tournament to the MGM Grand Garden Arena or even the South Point Arena. Maybe all the Cali schools support a centralized location in Los Angeles/Orange County areas?

The NCAA Tournament, or even the NIT Finals would be huge hits in Las Vegas.

(04-07-2018 04:43 PM)AuzGrams Wrote:  I've always been a big fan of Las Vegas (and even Reno for the Big Sky for the 3 years) for tournaments, there isn't many other big cities that can compete.

I don't know why the Big West doesn't move their tournament to the MGM Grand Garden Arena or even the South Point Arena. Maybe all the Cali schools support a centralized location in Los Angeles/Orange County areas?

The NCAA Tournament, or even the NIT Finals would be huge hits in Las Vegas.

They're smart to move it to Boise, though. Reno was empty