Sleep Train Arena, originally ARCO Arena and later Power Balance Pavilion, is an indoor arena located in Sacramento, California, United States. Opened in 1988, it was the home of the Sacramento Kings of the National Basketball Association (NBA) from 1988 to 2016. It hosted nearly 200 spectator events each year. The arena is named for The Sleep Train, a chain of mattress and bed retailers based in Rocklin, California, which in turn became Mattress Firm, a Houston, Texas-based company.
History
The original ARCO Arena (1985â€"1988), where the Kings played their home games for three seasons (1985 to 1988), after moving from Kansas City had a capacity of 10,333 seats.
Sleep Train Arena is located in a once isolated area on the expanding northern outskirts of the city. It was constructed at a cost of just $40 million, the lowest of any venue in the NBA. It is the smallest arena in the NBA with a seating capacity of 17,317, and has 30 luxury suites and 412 club seats. It can host such varied events as concerts, ice shows, rodeos and monster truck rallies. Nearly two million spectators from throughout Northern California visited Sleep Train Arena last year. The configuration for ice shows and ice hockey actually runs perpendicular to the basketball court with the normal sideline seating being retractable to allow for an international standard ice rink.
In 2006, there was a campaign to build a new $600 million facility in downtown Sacramento, which was to be funded by a quarter cent sales tax increase over 15 years; voters overwhelmingly rejected ballot measures Q and R, leading to the NBA publicly calling for a new arena to be built at another well-known Sacramento facility, Cal Expo, the site of California's state fair.
The original namesake sponsor of the arena was ARCO. On March 19, 2007, the Maloof brothers announced a multi-year agreement extending the naming rights of ARCO Arena. ARCO's sponsorship agreement ran out in February 2011. The arena was renamed Power Balance Pavilion on March 1, 2011 for its new sponsor, Power Balance, a manufacturer of sports wristbands. On October 15, 2012, the arena assumed its current name when The Sleep Train purchased the naming rights.
The arena's center-hung scoreboard was designed as a joint venture between Panasonic and White Way Sign. Originally it contained four LCD video screens (one on each side) plus enough room for two players' stats on each team; as pro basketball grew in popularity, the scoreboard was upgraded in 1991 so that stats for five players on each team could be shown; the original video screens were replaced a decade later with Panasonic Astrovision LED video screens.
Sleep Train Arena was still in use until December of 2016, even though the Kings and major concerts moved to the new Golden 1 Center in October 2016. There are no immediate plans on what to do with the arena or land surrounding it after the new arena opens.
The very last ticketed event at Sleep Train Arena was the Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus on September 19, 2016. The circus also opened the arena back in 1988. The very last event (Non-ticketed) was Sacramento State's winter commencement ceremonies on December 17, 2016.
Events
Sleep Train Arena has hosted several state high school basketball championship games (1992, 1996, 1998â€"2009, 2011-2016) Sleep Train Arena hosts many graduation celebrations for local high schools.
This was also the home for the WNBA's Sacramento Monarchs until they folded in 2009.
Sleep Train Arena has hosted several WWE events including the 1993 Royal Rumble, Judgment Day 2001, and The Bash in 2009.
Other notable events include the five-day 1995 Billy Graham Greater Sacramento Crusade, which 177,000 people attended. A crowd of 47,500 people reportedly showed up on one night of the event, when Michael W. Smith was the musical guest; only 18,000 people were permitted inside and many watched on outside television screens.
The arena has also hosted NCAA Men's Basketball Tournaments multiple times and was the host site for the 2007 NCAA Volleyball Championships. It has also hosted a PBR Built Ford Tough Series bull riding event every year since 2005.
Sleep Train Arena has played host to four Ultimate Fighting Championship events: UFC 65, UFC 73, UFC on Fox: Johnson vs. Benavidez 2 and UFC 177. The arena hosted World Extreme Cagefighting's first ever pay-per-view event, WEC 48, on April 24, 2010. It also hosted the WEC's two biggest events ever, WEC 34, Faber vs. Pulver 1, and WEC 41, Brown vs. Faber 2, with an average of 1,300,500 viewers on Versus each. It also hosted WEC.
The last Kings home game at Sleep Train Arena was on April 9, 2016, a 114-112 win against the Oklahoma City Thunder. The last points scored in the arena were two free throws by the Kings' Rudy Gay with one second left to clinch the game for the Kings.
ARCO Park
ARCO Park is an unfinished multi-purpose stadium directly north of the arena. The original plan was to have a AAA minor-league baseball stadium adjacent to the basketball stadium. The stadium would have been capable of expansion to accommodate both a Major League Baseball team and a National Football League team (possibly the Oakland Raiders). However, the facility was never finished because the Sacramento Sports Association ran out of money during construction in 1989 and a team was never secured. The remnants of this incomplete stadium include foundations and a tunnel leading to the basketball arena. With the construction of Raley Field for baseball and the later completion of the soccer-specific Papa Murphy's Park, it is unlikely the stadium will ever be completed.
Popular culture
There is an instrumental song called "Arco Arena" on the album Comfort Eagle by Sacramento band Cake. The band also released a version of the song with lyrics as a B-Side. The music video for Bell Biv DeVoe's "She's Dope" was filmed at the arena.
The arena set a Guinness World Record for loudest sports roar by reaching 126 decibels on November 15, 2013.
References
External links
- Official website
- Sleep Train Arena Seating Chart
