’No strangers to big events’: Rock Hill will host 3 college conference championships
Three conference champions will be crowned in a venue that isn’t open yet, but promises to be a new driving force in Rock Hill’s economic development.
Rock Hill and Southern Intercollegiate Athletic Conference leaders announced Monday morning a three-year partnership to bring basketball and volleyball championships to the Rock Hill Sports & Event Center. Volleyball will run Nov. 18-20. Men’s and women’s basketball arrives March 2-7, 2020.
Gregory Moore, commissioner of the Division II conference based in Atlanta, said the SIAC is honored to be the first intercollegiate event coming to the new sports and event center. Rock Hill had the best combination of community engagement, a new facility and close proximity to a league school.
“We just like the whole turnkey approach of having an event that can really grow into becoming a community event,” Moore said.
The league has 14 member schools in South Carolina, Alabama, Georgia, Kentucky, Tennessee and Ohio. The lone South Carolina school is Benedict College in Columbia. Benedict will serve as host to the upcoming tournaments.
Joining Benedict for the events are Albany State, Central State, Clark Atlanta, Fort Valley State, Kentucky State, Savannah State and Tuskegee universities along with Lane, LeMoyne-Owen, Miles, Morehouse, Paine and Spring Hill colleges. The league largely consists of historically black schools.
“The track record here in Rock Hill, the facilities and the championships, we’ve had some outstanding championships here,” said Willie Washington, Benedict athletic director. “Track and field, cross country, I’ve had the opportunity to come up to visit those. And we expect to have outstanding championships in volleyball and basketball.”
Winthrop University recently hosted SIAC cross country and track and field championships for the conference.
Visit York County president and CEO Billy Dunlap said working with the SIAC for those events helped in bidding the basketball and volleyball tournaments.
“They’ve all been first class in terms of their professionalism, so that really gave Billy and his group and colleagues a great deal of credibility when they expressed interest with respect to our basketball tournament,” Moore said.
Moore said he expects the coming tournaments to bring in fans from throughout his league’s footprint.
“We’re going to work very hard to make sure that we engage not just the Rock Hill community, but engage our fans in Atlanta and Memphis and Birmingham to make it out here and support our schools and student athletes,” he said.
What it means for Rock Hill
The announcement is significant for Rock Hill in what it foreshadows.
The city-owned sports center opens in late October and should generate about $10 million of the $30-$40 million annual economic impact from city-owned sports facilities, said city parks, recreation and tourism director John Taylor.
“It’s another piece of the puzzle for the sports tourism and economic impact of our area,” he said.
Rock Hill and Birmingham, Ala., were the finalists for the volleyball and basketball championships. Rock Hill tourism leaders sold their ability to host with the new sports and event center, featuring a 1,200-seat championship court along with a 700-seat main court (eight basketball or 16 volleyball court capacity) and 8,000 square feet of multipurpose event space.
Taylor said he expects the 170,000-square-foot venue to host events 40 or more weekends a year. His group estimates about 180,000 tourists and 8,000 hotel room night stays annually.
“A lot of basketball, a lot of volleyball, but we have gymnastics, we have dance, cheer,” Taylor said. “We’re talking to a whole bunch of other groups, even a beard growing group. So we will not shy away from any event that will help bring dollars into Rock Hill.”
Conferences, trade shows, concerts, cultural events all are options. Taylor said city leaders aren’t concerned signing on for major events like the SIAC tournaments even without a finished building. Last year city sports facilities brought in more than $22 million in economic impact dollars with attendance of 185,000 people. The past decade the numbers are more than $200 million with 1.7 million visitors spending 282,000 room nights.
“We’re no strangers to big events,” Taylor said. “We hosted 48 different countries here with the world BMX championships so we don’t shy away from things like that. We’ll be ready to go.”
City committed to sports
Dunlap said he sees the new sports site as the next progression for a city committed to sports.
“Rock Hill sets the pace in the country for recreational facilities, for a city government,” he said. “From the Velodrome to the BMX to Manchester Meadows to Cherry Park — where it all started — to the new sports and events center. Rock Hill sets the tone in the country for recreational facilities.”
The SIAC tournaments are unusual, Dunlap said, because most Division II events and even smaller Div. I championships take place largely at member school sites. Week-long events at a single, non-member school site usually come only from the largest conferences in the country.
“Typically it’s your Power 5 conferences that host a week-long event,” he said.
Dunlap said he expects more than 10,000 people to attend the events announced Monday, with about 500 participants and demand for 1,400 hotel rooms to generate $1.2 million in economic impact. With few events like it, having the new sports site is critical for Rock Hill and York County, Dunlap said.
“When we go around and we’re talking to events rights holders that are in the basketball and volleyball realm, the Rock Hill indoor sports and events center changes everything,” he said.
Moore said his conference has plenty in common with South Carolina and Rock Hill. It’s best known for football, but basketball is a growing and strong base. Being able to use a brand new facility in Rock Hill seemed like a great opportunity, he said.
“We felt that the facility was well thought out in terms of its proximity to hotels, restaurants,” Moore said. “It’s the right size facility.”
This story was originally published July 29, 2019 at 4:07 PM.