William B. Stokely Jr. is pictured in 1965 with, left to right, Howard Bayne, Red Robbins, and A.W. Davis.
Ernie & Bernie packed the house. Olympians Justin Gatlin and Benita Fitzgerald ran there. Elvis even gyrated there.
Its heyday long over, Stokely Athletics Center will be going away in the next three to six years.
Long-range plans are in play for the University of Tennessee athletic department to vacate Stokely, men's athletic director Mike Hamilton confirmed Friday.
UT's master campus plan calls for the athletic department to turn the facility over to the academic realm whenever space can be found for employees and sports teams.
"That will be a three- or four-year process,'' said Jeff Maples, UTK senior associate vice chancellor. "We've just now started talking about options.''
It might be even longer than that.
"It's conceivable it might be five or six years,'' Hamilton said.
"There's no immediacy, but it is something we have to plan for down the road.''
There is immediacy for women's volleyball and the indoor track teams.
A fire marshal ruled last year the building was no longer fit for crowds. Volleyball was granted a waiver for the 2007 season, Hamilton said.
Volleyball games will move to Thompson-Boling Arena next season, although the team will be allowed to practice in Stokely, its home since a 1998 renovation.
A match last November was delayed for an hour because rain leaked through the roof.
Indoor track can also practice in Stokely but UT's men's and women's teams will have to compete at meets away from home.
The building has also been ruled off limits to UT's summer sports camps.
Hamilton said the men's and women's athletic departments have to find other space for 110 employees, as well as the two sports.
There is limited office space available in the McKenzie-Lawson Center, Hamilton said. Baseball eventually will move its offices to Lindsey Nelson Stadium, Maples said.
Stokely's most likely fate is the wrecking ball.
"Renovation would be very, very costly,'' Maples said. "That's not a very good option."
Hamilton said new facilities for volleyball and indoor track will eventually be built.
"What we've got to decide is whether that's one facility or two separate facilities,'' he said. "The first preference is one.''
In addition to athletics, the Department of Military Science also has offices in Stokely.
The site occupied by Stokely began as the Armory Fieldhouse, a 7,500-seat gym for basketball that opened in 1959.
The success created after the arrival of Ray Mears to coach men's basketball in 1962 necessitated a larger venue.
A gift from William B. Stokely Jr., allowed UT to expand the Armory to the 12,700-seat Stokely Athletics Center for the 1966-67 basketball season.
Spurred by the popularity of the Ernie Grunfeld and Bernard King teams in the 1970s, UT decided to go bigger again. Thompson-Boling Arena opened in 1987.
Thompson-Boling became UT's primary venue for not only sports but concerts and other events.
A number of major entertainers performed at Stokely, including Elvis Presley in 1972.
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Comments » 33
peerlessvolfan writes:
Sigh. I have such happy memories there.
tmartin writes:
i say we renovate it and move men's b ball back to stokely. can you imagine how insane (more so than cameron) it would be inside that place with 12,000 packed in there?
ronnpaula7#225022 writes:
This article suggests Mike Hamilton refused to fund even the most basic upkeep of the building.
A leaky roof? Come on Mike. You should have preserved the building better than that! It will cost the University much more to eventually replace it than it would have been to maintain it all along.
This appears to be simple mismanagement of a once valuable campus resource.
DeerPark12 writes:
Anybody who thinks that mismanagement is the reason for the end of Stokely doesn't have the first clue about the situation.
The building's tin roof is lined with asbestos tiles. Because of the way it was constructed, any removal of asbestos from the ceiling would require removal of the entire roof, something that has an estimated cost of $4-6 million.
Furthermore, the building has no sprinklers or air conditioning in the arena area. Because of the sprinkler issue, the fire marshal will not allow competitions to be held there. Why not add sprinklers? Because adding a sprinkler system would require drilling into the aforementioned asbestos-line ceiling/roof. State law requires that if those panels are disturbed, they must be removed entirely, and we're back at $4-6 million.
And that's just a start. A removal of the asbestos-lined roof would be considered a renovation, which means the entire building must be brought up to current codes. With that, we're talking ramps, elevators (the building currently has none), and numerous other very expensive elements. With all the factors, it is far less expensive to build a new facility for the athletic offices and displaced teams that it would be to renovate Stokely.
Finally, the academic side of the University has long expressed interest in building new student housing, classroom space and a parking facility on the property where Stokely now sits.
Hunter writes:
Would have been great to have one last game there. How much do you think Mikey H. could have charged for those tickets? $200 or more per ticket wouldn't be an unreasonable starting point I am guessing. Upwards of $1000 courtside.....could almost cover some of the renovation........
snafu14u#241639 writes:
I remember the Ernie/Bernie Show @ Stokley. went there many times. It was a sweatbox, but no one seemed to mind. Go Vols. bonzaivol
volfan73120#211815 writes:
Other than basketball, My favorite memories of Stokley was seeing Elvis perform, and seeing Bob Hope perfkorm there.
pinesvol writes:
Good post, deerpark12 - thanks.
THE_VOL writes:
STOP THE WRECKING BALL!!!! This MUST become STOKELY DETENTION CENTER FOR MISGUIDED FOOTBALL PLAYERS! Just think - FOOLmer as Warden could have his morning disciplinary runs right there in the facility with the indoor track. Yessiree, one lap for smoking weed, two laps for theft/robbery, and three laps for the most serious offenses like imitating a football coach!!!!
GerryOP writes:
OMG -- Howard Bayne, Red Robbins, and A.W. Davis! Remember them well!
mike.reinhardt#231757 writes:
Wow I remember running indoor track in the 70's that place was really HOT.. Everyone dreamed of being B/E
rray044#360255 writes:
DeerPark12: Thanks for the update on the situation at Stokley. You seem well informed, so I stand corrected.
It seems like what was shared in your post should have been included in Strange's article. The way it was written, it's a bit like being told you've got six months to live, but not being told why. Searching the govols archive was just as informative.
This building's saga is deserving of a story of its own.
tigervol9802 writes:
Never got to see a bball game there. My only memories were three Dance Marathons.
I'll be interested to see what UT does with it. With the plans of a parking garage going in behind the rock in the next couple of years, I can't imagine it being anything else other than new dorms.
TommyJack writes:
GerryOP: Had forgotten about Howard Bayne. He was the designated enforcer. A real bad apple in a tussle. Think he had a tryout with the Cowboys because of his bad attitude.
mattingly writes:
If you look carefully at the pictures of the Armory and Stokely, the floor ran in the same direction in both arenas. What happened was that when the arena was enlarged and seats added on the west side, the floor moved eastward. I saw games in both arenas and remember clearly how they brought the north end football bleachers in from Neyland Stadium to make the east side bleachers for student seating and for the broadcast locations. Both arenas were something special.
GerryOP writes:
TJ, you're right about Bayne. He showed up at one of our parties one night! Ended up calling the cops! Hmmmm, don't think it ever made the KNS! I had a class with Ol' A.W. A true redneck hillbilly ... and dang proud of it!
TommyJack writes:
GerryOP. I think I was a frosh when AW was a Sr...He was about 6'7" and looked to weigh about 90 lbs....Had a mean J from the baseline, tho.
GerryOP writes:
TJ, A.W. played '63-'65, same class as Pat Robinette and a year ahead of Bayne and Robbins -- '64-'66. I believe Ron Widby was the 5th starter in '65. I remember A.W. telling me how " ... Coach Mears brought him down from the hills of Kentucky and everything he owned he was either wearin' or carryin' in a paper poke!" Don't think Ol' A.W. ever did put on any weight!
liblrogers#592188 writes:
GerryOP, not sure what AW meant by that...he is from Grainger County and still lives there...the Rutledge Rifle.
GerryOP writes:
Hmmm TJ, I don't know either. Of course, my memory could not be failing me!!!! It was only 40 years ago! Don't know ....
SFOrange writes:
Terrific old barn for basketball. During the winter the huge glass windows over the entry ways would steam over...you'd walk in and the arena and it'd be 80F..the place rocked. TBA will never be able duplicate the din that 12700 of us made.
Kwitcherbellyachin writes:
The first game I saw there was when UT beat a top-ten ranked Va Tech team manned by Del Curry. The place was a madhouse. I picked up my first schedule there at UTK, but the next semester, they started having registration at TBA. Seems like I had a class or two there, but that's too long ago for me to recall. I know we didn't play intramural hoops there, because we used to play at HPER or Alumni Gym back then. I do remember watching a few practices of the Lady Vols there though. Too bad they couldn't preserve it or something.
DeerPark12 writes:
I didn't mean to sound harsh in my posting, just trying to get the info out there.
I too have great memories of Stokely, tho I am too young to have experienced basketball there, it is still a place that is very dear to my heart. Some of my greatest college memories came from that building, the first was getiing to be the PA announcer for my very first college sporting event, a volleyball game in fall of 2002.
Over the past 7 years, I've had many special memories there and will miss it in the way I saw it, as a volleyball arena, track, and basketball practice facility and home for summer sports camps.
One small story: I met Bruce Pearl there on his second day on the job, and a very small thing he said that impressed me far more than any of his basketball wins has. I was working for the volleyball team at the time, and we used both courts there for practice, tho the men's bball team under the Buzzball administration routinely kicked us off the second court so they could practice/run/condition/whatever. We were in the middle of spring practice and getting ready for a session. Bruce had just come in with some of the guys for an offseason workout. I asked him how long they were going to be so I could report back to our coach how long we were only going to have one court. Instead of an arrogant response as I had usually gotten from the previous staff, Bruce asked for our schedule, so he could schedule around US. I had never been so shocked in my life. I'll never forget his words: "What we have to remember is, this is volleyball's facility, we just borrow it. We'll schedule around you, because you have just as much right to compete for a championship for this university as we do." The guy just gets it.
I happened to be in the building this fall visiting some former co-workers and was walking thru the gym as the men's team was conducting its last ever practice in Stokely. At the end of the practice, Bruce brought the team together and told a long story on the history of Stokely and its place in the history of Tennessee Basketball. It was an awesome sight to behold.
ATLVOL1 writes:
wait wait wait wait, The University of Tennessee is closing an athletics bldg for Academics?
hippie60 writes:
The Gary Carter shot to win the game against America University. The Bob Seger concert best memories of Stokley
snowvol writes:
Women's volleyball has slowly become a solid program worthy of top-flight student athletes from around the nation considering UT as their home. I hope they get a facility built for them that befits where the program has risen to. Indoor track deserves no less. My suspicion is that Hamilton and Co. will go the cheap route and eventually build something that looks little more than a glorified high school facility.
Both of those programs deserve the same kind of attention that women's soccer, softball and baseball have received with respect to facility building or renovation.
Alphafemale writes:
I used to do Aerobics in Stokley. I wish I could have appreciated soaking up the history of the building back then.
b.skelton#207404 writes:
I remember dancing on the basketball court to the Tennessee Waltz in the early 80s after a great comeback win against KY, who I believe was ranked in the top 5 at the time.
N2Motorsports writes:
Video clips of Louisville vs. Kentucky in the 1983 MidEast Regional at Stokely.
http://video.aol.com/video-detail/cbs...
anthony writes:
codes, commodes, move over Liberia here we come.
pdhuff#552644 writes:
I like the 3-6 yr schedule. Kinda like my plans to paint the old tobacco barn by the creek. War department doen't think that's humorous.
The $$$$ has doomed Stokely.
kb7398#233189 writes:
Ah! A.W. Davis..."The Rutledge Rifle."
jasvol writes:
Wreck it.
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