Criticism of Loyd Noble
I don't like this article. I think the blame should be placed on the Hornets organization for not opening up sale of tickets to the general public earlier. You can't expect every season holder to drive all the way down to Norman. The 11,000+ was surely more that attended the game in BR.
Not even Hornets can fill Lloyd Noble
By John Rohde
The Oklahoman
NORMAN - Friday night was another moving experience for the Hornets.
Their game against the Sacramento Kings was moved from the Pete Maravich Assembly Center in Baton Rouge, La., to Lloyd Noble Center in Norman, which became necessary when the Hornets were moved from New Orleans to Oklahoma City after Hurricane Katrina moved into the Gulf of Mexico.
Rand McNally would have trouble locating this team.
The home team (the Hornets, I think) won 90-76 before a crowd of 11,343.
The most important figure of the night, other than the score, fell roughly 650 short of capacity.
Not even the warm-and-cuddly Hornets can fill the cold and lonely Lloyd Noble Center these days.
There is no official handbook on how to properly relocate a relocated pro basketball team.
The Hornets are learning these type things on the fly this season, as are we all. And Friday’s relocation project was a bit of a crash course.
The Hornets were expecting standing room only, judging by their initial proclamation no tickets would be made available to the general public. They figured their 10,000 full-season ticket holders would gobble up the seats, followed by the partial-season ticket holders.
The Hornets instead wound up making tickets available to all takers. That hit a snag Friday morning when the team’s website was unable to sell online tickets.
The Hornets were arrogant in their assumption tickets would disappear quickly, especially as bargain prices.
Then again, what were they supposed to think? We’ve been all abuzz since their arrival in late September.
Because attendance was so atrociously low (7,302) when the Hornets played Phoenix in Baton Rouge on Dec. 16, the Hornets wisely chose to switch two games back to Oklahoma City (and three others to New Orleans Arena in March) rather than return to the LSU campus.
The Hornets wanted Friday’s game to be played in the Ford Center, but Bon Jovi had the placed booked to set up for tonight’s concert.
When all attempts to wrestle the Ford Center away failed, the Hornets announced Lloyd Noble was the alternate site.
That happened Monday. Tickets went on sale to season ticket holders only on Tuesday. Panic set in sometime Thursday afternoon. Friday essentially was a ticket free-for-all.
Recapping what had to be one of the more hellish weeks in the Hornets’ season of hell, Hornets director of corporate communications Michael Thompson shook his head and smiled.
Thompson admitted the Hornets waited too long to announce an alternate site, but stood firm in the decision to open sales to season ticket holders first rather than the general public.
“I think our protocol was correct,” Thompson said. “Obviously, it happened very quickly, but it happened the right way.”
Selling 11,343 seats essentially from scratch in four days is pretty heady stuff when you consider:
<LI>Friday night is, well, Friday night. People make plans.
<LI>High school basketball had a full slate, especially coming off Christmas break.
<LI>With the Martin Luther King holiday on Monday, we’re in the midst of a three-day weekend.
<LI>This year’s Sacramento Kings aren’t last year’s Kings (or the year before’s), so the opponent wasn’t particularly alluring.
What did the Hornets learn this week?
“We learned people from Oklahoma like to plan ahead. That’s what we learned,” Thompson said.
That learning process will be put to good use for Wednesday night’s relocated game against Memphis at the Ford Center.
Tickets go on sale at 10 this morning. And they’re available for everyone.
John Rohde: 475-3314, jrohde@oklahoman.com; John Rohde can be heard Monday-Friday from 6-7 p.m. on WWLS-FM 104.9 and WWLS-AM 640, and on KYAL-AM 1550 in Tulsa.
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