NBA-Ready arena to be built in Las Vegas

Even if the idea of an NBA expansion is not on the agenda, there is still an old sea serpent around the cities of Seattle and Las Vegas. Regularly in recent years, they come back in the news and place themselves to host a new NBA franchise.

The latest news about Las Vegas will clearly continue to feed the rumors. Indeed, a new 20,000-seat NBA-standard arena will be built in “Sin City”. Work is expected to begin next year.

“It will be a world-class venue,” says Tim Leiweke, the boss of the Oak View Group, which is behind the project. “We’re going to spend a billion dollars to build it. It will be used for concerts, sports, cultural activities. If the NBA decides to come, and there’s no guarantee for that even though they should come, we’ll have a ready-made NBA hall that meets the standards.”

This ideal basketball venue will be located ten minutes from the Las Vegas Strip, the most famous part of the city, where the casinos and hotels are located.

Although Las Vegas has already hosted the All-Star Game, in 2007, in the T-Mobile Arena, and remains a stronghold of the NBA, thanks to the Summer League played every summer for almost twenty years now at the Thomas & Mack Center, seeing an NBA team there is not in the news. Adam Silver had already calmed the city’s ardor in 2019.

Nevertheless, it seems clear that with such a setting, Las Vegas confirms its status as a favorite if a 31st team is to be imagined or a franchise move is considered in the future.