SEC Basketball Players Voted Thompson-Boling Arena the Best in the Conference and They Are Absolutely Correct

The Athletic conducted a poll at the SEC Tipoff on Wednesday and asked players a few questions about basketball in the conference heading into the 2019-20 season. One question asked the players the best arena in the conference and the top response may surprise some who don’t follow SEC basketball closely.

The Athletic —

Best SEC arena

• Thompson-Boling Arena, Tennessee (8)
• Rupp Arena, Kentucky (7)
• Bud Walton Arena, Arkansas (6)
• Auburn Arena, Auburn (3)

Others receiving single votes: Exactech Arena (aka O Dome), Florida; Stegeman Coliseum, Georgia; Coleman Coliseum, Alabama; The Pavilion, Ole Miss

And we have our first upset. Big Blue Nation generates big noise for the big games, and Rupp Arena oozes with tradition, but TBA is frankly a nicer facility and more consistently rowdy. The players, by a narrow margin, agreed. Even Kentucky’s EJ Montgomery.

“We couldn’t hear each other, couldn’t hear Coach, because it was that loud in there,” he said of the Wildcats’ 19-point loss in Knoxville last season. “Everyone is going crazy, everyone is against you, and you gotta play your best to get a win there, for sure,” added Nembhard, who lost by a dozen at Tennessee.

That’s right, y’all. The best college basketball arena not only in the South, but the entire country, is in Knoxville, Tennessee.

It feels nice to have opposing players acknowledge the kind of home court advantage the Vols have, particularly in the last couple years. Some of my favorite sports memories ever have been in the last two seasons of Tennessee basketball and the environment in Thompson-Boling has been unbelievable.

The North Carolina game in 2017-18, the Georgia game later that season — the regular season finale in which the Vols clinched the SEC title — and the Kentucky game last season are three of the best environments I’ve ever been in for any game, college football included.

And if you needed any more proof of the Vols’ home court advantage, UT comes into the 2019-20 season with a 26-game home winning streak, the longest active streak in the country. The teams Rick Barnes built the past couple seasons certainly helped, but Tennessee has always been underrated as a basketball fanbase — UT has ranked in the top 25 nationally in attendance every season since it began being tracked in 1969-70, with 20 of those seasons being in the top 10.

Thompson-Boling will be rocking again this season. Here’s hoping Tennessee adequately replaces the production left behind by Grant and Admiral and makes some more noise in the SEC. Go Vols.