Seattle U Hoops Unveils Its Home

Soon-to-be Division I basketballers Seattle U showed off a sharp-looking new court last night at KeyArena, part of a ticket-sales-event cum media-event cum scrimmage. One benefit of KeyArena for the Redhawks: the seats are already red. All that was left was to create a Seattle U court, which was painted over the summer and laid down for the first time just in the past few days.

Pretty sweet, huh? Up in the media room, they had sandwiches and beer, and also longtime sports radio host Dave Grosby, who'll be doing the play-by-play of every Redhawks game, home and away, on 710 ESPN.

This won't be Grosby's first time with nascent DI program; as a teenager, his radio-executive Dad got him a gig as play-by-play man for Iona University. Iona was coached by a young, unknown go-getter named Jim Valvano, Valvano took the Gaels from DI upstarts to nationally-ranked in just a few seasons.

Charles Garcia, Seattle U's top player

"He was a master recruiter," Grosby told me. "He got (future NBA star Jeff) Ruland when top schools wanted him."

Recruiting is the key, in Grosby's view, and because Seattle U has hired one of the best recruiters in college hoops as their coach in former UW assistant Cameron Dollar, he thinks they could be winning sooner than people think.

One benefit of Dollar's recruiting prowess was on display down on the new court: forward Charles Garcia. The JC transfer, originally scheduled to attend Washington, went to Seattle U instead and will clearly be the focal point of this team. Garcia is 6-10, but fast and athletic. He can guard in the perimeter and in the post, and can score inside and out. He will be the most talented player on the floor in many of SU's games this year (especially against Harvard) -- a benefit the school rarely had last year.

Garcia is fun to watch--as tall and athletic as he is, he can play above the rim to an extent not seen in Seattle U basketball this century.

The ticket sales part of the event seemed to be going well. At halftime of the scrimmage, Seattle U AD Bill Hogan announced that they'd sold 100 season seats at the event. My Seattle U alum friend is getting on the phone today to buy seats, he wants "to get in on the ground floor of this, then in 20 years, once SU is the new Gonzaga, I will be sitting pretty." (Literally!)

There are scads of sweet seats available, and at a very, very reasonable price--$40 gets you a season ticket in one of the first few rows behind the basket. With 13 home games on the schedule, that's barely $3/ticket. Or be a "high-roller" and get two seats at center court for just $225. Here's the link to their ticket page if you're interested.

And who knows, you could find yourself sitting next to Seattle U legend and former NBAer Tom Workman!