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In no particular order:

1 - New and/or brighter lights.
At the game against Baylor, I counted the light fixtures on the ceiling. There are 69 of them, only 62 of which actually appear to work. The light in my master closet seems to have more wattage than those hanging in Moody. I'm sure the fixtures are OK, but we need to increase the brightness in there.
Quick - name the places where crowds gather in the dark, or in low-light? Operas/symphonies, theatres, planterariums. All of them are places where people are trained to be silent. Want to make Moody louder? Make it brighter.

2 - Repaint the floor.
The floor design is fine with the lettering and the big Mustang in the middle. But the red ain't red enough and the blue ain't blue enough. Let's make the blue perimeter darker to match the navy blue that's on the uniforms. The current blue (look at it yourself next time in Moody) is faded and looks horribly old. The red on the horse and lettering also looks old. A good paint job shouldn't cost too much.

3 - Get the band a better setup.
Are they the hub of SMU spirit or not? Let's make them look a little better but getting them off of those wooden bleachers! Do we want them to play and offer some spirit, or spend time pulling wooden splinters out of their instruments? Those bleachers worked for Doc Hayes, but not in the new millenium.
How about getting them some nice risers with some decent seats and a music stand or two? And move them closer to the court by bouncing the auxiliary press folks somewhere else (see below).

4 - Move the scouts elsewhere on the court. The few scouts we get at the games have a very odd experience, I'm sure. First, they've got the band blaring behind them. (Nothing against the band - they play great stuff. But I wouldn't want to be sitting in front of them when they're at full force.) Then you've got the couch potato guys either sitting in front of them or to the side. So their position at the game is as good as some random students who get to move onto the court and act stupid the whole game with a free pizza. Great way to cater to the scouts.
Proposal - get rid of some of those folding-chair seats along the one-half of the courtside, and extend the media tables at midcourt across from the teams' benches to include room for 10-12 scouts. Then move the folding-chair seats to the baseline, where the scouts are now.
Sorry guys who have the folding-chair seats, but SMU's got to cater to the media and scout folks. You give them a good experience, and they're more likely to come back.

5 - New central scoreboard.
I've been going to the games at Moody since 1972, and the scoreboard hasn't changed since. I'm not asking for Jumbotron or HDTV monitors (wouldn't that be cool, though, for replays?). But how about some more scoring detail on the board listing the five players on the floor with their points and fouls? Their are high schools with better scoreboards than SMU has. If it looks cheap, it is cheap - and don't think recruits and fans don't notice.
Surely there's a sponsor willing to put up part of the tab for a new scoreboard and gain prime advertising space there.

6 - Cheerleaders and Dance Team.
Is it possible to get the same number of cheerleaders and dance team folks there every game? This is their extracurricular JOB, right? Some games there are four cheerleaders, some games 10, some games five - can we get some type of continuity? Are they required to go to the games or not? Trust me, they're not at study hall every Thursday and Saturday night.

Just some random thoughts on how to make basketball better at SMU. The total cost of these changes can't be that much, if you count the sponsored-scoreboard.
How about it?

Yea, most of these ideas have been posted before. Nothing will get done posting here though....I think the scoreboard should be #1. It would be great to have pts and fouls per player on the floor. Moody is better than Rice but that's about it...maybe Gonzaga gym.


I am thinking the floor will change when we get into C-USA.
The rest will be done when that big donor comes along....whenver that will be...haha.

Demented in Dallas wrote: .... 4 - Move the scouts elsewhere on the court. The few scouts we get at the games have a very odd experience, I'm sure. First, they've got the band blaring behind them. (Nothing against the band - they play great stuff. But I wouldn't want to be sitting in front of them when they're at full force.) Then you've got the couch potato guys either sitting in front of them or to the side. So their position at the game is as good as some random students who get to move onto the court and act stupid the whole game with a free pizza. Great way to cater to the scouts.
Proposal - get rid of some of those folding-chair seats along the one-half of the courtside, and extend the media tables at midcourt across from the teams' benches to include room for 10-12 scouts. Then move the folding-chair seats to the baseline, where the scouts are now.
Sorry guys who have the folding-chair seats, but SMU's got to cater to the media and scout folks. You give them a good experience, and they're more likely to come back....

From a purely selfish standpoint, this is the biggest one to me. For some of the games, I sit on the floor ad mid-court on the media table. For others, I'm on the end in front of the band. I love the Mustang Band, but sitting right in front of the band, your brain gets scrambled (don't take that as a complaint, Bandfolks - keep blasting the roof off the place). However, as much as I'd like to see the media table on the sideline get extended (like it used to be), it'll never happen. Folks pay good money for those courtside seats, and SMU needs to keep all possible revenue coming in.

Thanks for the compliment, PonyPride. We like to hear that we're playing loudly. Sorry it hurts your brains, though. By the way, who are the people who sit on the couch during the men's games, and why aren't they there for the women's?

Demented in Dallas wrote:3 - Get the band a better setup.
Are they the hub of SMU spirit or not? Let's make them look a little better but getting them off of those wooden bleachers! Do we want them to play and offer some spirit, or spend time pulling wooden splinters out of their instruments? Those bleachers worked for Doc Hayes, but not in the new millenium.
How about getting them some nice risers with some decent seats and a music stand or two? And move them closer to the court by bouncing the auxiliary press folks somewhere else (see below).

Of all the things you listed, I would say this one would be the last. Those fun wooden bleachers the band stands on are pretty sturdy. Even though they are rather old, we never sit down, so having nice seats shouldn't be an issue. Besides, with actual seats instead of bleachers, it takes away so much room for people to play, thus what we discovered in Fresno last year. And I think we're cool with music stands as well, but could always use more.

We're fine where we are. Sure, some things would be a nice change, but we don't NEED the change to happen a la some of the other points you noted.

Demented in Dallas wrote:6 - Cheerleaders and Dance Team.
Is it possible to get the same number of cheerleaders and dance team folks there every game? This is their extracurricular JOB, right? Some games there are four cheerleaders, some games 10, some games five - can we get some type of continuity? Are they required to go to the games or not? Trust me, they're not at study hall every Thursday and Saturday night.

Ugh. Don't we all wish...

The dance team only shows up to games whenever they are performing, so the entire "cheering" section of Moody rests on the cheerleaders. The band yells and whatnot, but we don't have anythin organized. It's just someone starts screaming and a drum starts banging.

Great post! I think there are a number of relatively inexpensive things that can be done. It only takes some common sense or someone on this board to bring them up to Copeland. What other ideas do we have?

Diamond Girl wrote:By the way, who are the people who sit on the couch during the men's games, and why aren't they there for the women's?

They usually are there for women's games too. It's just some kids or a family chosen by some of the marketing people at the beginning of the game to sit courtside and have pizza. Nothing too special.

Well, if the band is happy with its arrangement, then I can withdraw the previous post, per Diamond Girl and Barbara Ann. Just trying to get you the digs you deserve.

And to the other post about the courtside seats, people play good money for those courtside seats, granted. And sure, we need the money. But they should be just as happy in the blue seats, which always seem to be only half-filled. Besides, those folding-chair seats looks dangerous to me, especially for the little kids that sit there.
Still, the scouts deserve some consideration too. It's all about the professional perception of the program. The scouts and other media don't get a good experience here, and need to get better than they have. We don't have to spoil them, but there's alternatives to having them sit in front of the band and in the poorest courtside seats available.

Just my thoughts . . .

GREAT POST! But I agree, the number one thing should be a change in the scoreboard. It is just embarrasing.
If we're not going to change the scoreboard, then why don't why at least change the screens at opposite floor entrances? The ones that right now show like "FOUL PLAY" and have a duck run by.....LAME.
Can we change those to give a little more info? Which is cheaper?

Also, the paintjob is another good idea. I LOVE the moody feel, how you can get right down in the action, but it does need some sprucing up. Seriously, I don't think we should change the whole arena, especially if it was to look like the Tulsa arena, Fresno, or even TCU. The closest fans are a million miles away.

Demented in Dallas wrote:Well, if the band is happy with its arrangement, then I can withdraw the previous post, per Diamond Girl and Barbara Ann. Just trying to get you the digs you deserve.

Well, it USED to be that we sat on risers. That was even back when we had sell-outs and nationally ranked teams. Having sat in the bleachers with alums during christmas break, I personally would prefer to see the risers come back with no one between us and the floor.

But, that's just my opinion, too.

The plans that have been in place for a number of years call for a Jumbotron replacement for the current scoreboard. Believe it or not, this is realistic as the prices have dropped dramatically and are tied into advertising revenue. North Texas, for goodness sake, has a Jumbotron in their basketball facility.

They also call for widening the halls by blowing out the offices (everybody moves to Ford) except for the basketball coaches, and suites around the top, among other things.

Diehard Pony wrote:The plans that have been in place for a number of years call for a Jumbotron replacement for the current scoreboard. Believe it or not, this is realistic as the prices have dropped dramatically and are tied into advertising revenue. North Texas, for goodness sake, has a Jumbotron in their basketball facility.

They also call for widening the halls by blowing out the offices (everybody moves to Ford) except for the basketball coaches, and suites around the top, among other things.

Those would both be drastic improvements. Not that the hallway width reall bothers me, but anything to make the place look better is an improvement. And the scoreboards look like the graphics are being done on an Etch-a-Sketch. Get the JumboTron. SOON.

Corso wrote: And the scoreboards look like the graphics are being done on an Etch-a-Sketch.

But they better keep the "FOWL" waddling duck animation and the "TEMPTING AROMA" flashing animation. Those are the best ever.

Tempting Aroma? When the hell do they do that? What are they talking about?

BarbaraAnn wrote:But they better keep the "FOWL" waddling duck animation and the "TEMPTING AROMA" flashing animation. Those are the best ever.

We've laughed at those for years! Don't forget the classic "hand turning volume knob" with CRANK it up!