Charlie Daniels owes his affiliation with Las Vegas to Lake Tahoe. And Frank Sinatra. And Willie Nelson. This rodeo ride to Las Vegas does make sense, as it has led ...
The goal of the evening was simple: Introduce a new generation in my family to UNLV basketball. That’s what we native Las Vegans do with our children. We bring them to the Thomas & Mack Center for a taste of one of the highlights of our youth, hoping they will also get a case of Runnin’ Rebel fever. It’s a rite of passage, a baptism of sorts in cheering for a basketball program that’s near and dear to our hearts.
Since it opened, the Thomas & Mack Center has become one of the most storied and successful collegiate venues in the country. As the Mack celebrates its 30th birthday, UNLV officials are taking stock of their arena, celebrating its successes so far but also looking toward its future.
As today marks the 30th anniversary of the Thomas & Mack Center at UNLV, we honor the Las Vegas landmark with a Top 10 list of memorable moments at the T&M.
Whether the UNLV basketball team was playing a nationally televised game or a run-of-the-mill foe, locals flocked to the Thomas & Mack Center for the best show in a city known for its over-the-top productions.
Because of the building’s reputation for holding events across such a wide spectrum of categories, many tend to gloss over its fight history. To others, however, the bouts have more than secured their place in the Thomas & Mack’s lore.
Improbably, the Los Angeles Lakers and Abdul-Jabbar were playing against Utah in a Las Vegas “home” game for the Jazz. The Jazz weren’t faring so well in Salt Lake City, so its brass decided to play 11 games in Las Vegas during the 1983-84 season. A crowd of 18,389 – mostly Lakers fans – gathered to witness history.
They were 16-0 in their building when Louisville visited Las Vegas, so a victory over the Cardinals would give UNLV its best home season in its 7-year-old arena. It was the only season in which more than 300,000 fans packed the Mack, and they saw history in the making.
To say that the National Finals Rodeo has become the Thomas & Mack Center's cash cow is putting it literally, not mildly. There's nothing mild about the NFR.
The audience swayed to the classic-rock house music, and when the familiar guitar intro to “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band” kicked in, whoever was manning the volume jacked it up past nine, to 11, and out marched the band whose soaring live performance would certainly pay tribute to the still-wrenching tragedy. As the band charged into “Elevation,” the lights stayed up, almost to the song’s end as fans bounced and roared. Maybe America wasn’t quite “back,” but U2 was.
Emotions were mixed for the Los Angeles Lakers as they headed east for a 'home' playoff game on May 3, 1992. Trailing 2-1 in a best-of-five first round series with the top-seeded Portland Trailblazers, Game Four was moved from riot-riddled L.A. to Las Vegas. Both teams sat around between games Three and Four while Los Angeles burned in the wake of the verdict from the Rodney King beating trial.