Value City Arena
Value City Arena is a multi-purpose arena, located on the campus of Ohio State University, in Columbus, Ohio, United States. The arena opened in 1998 and is currently the largest by seating capacity in the Big Ten Conference, with 19,049 seats, which is reduced to 18,809 for Ohio State men's and women’s basketball games.[5]
Full name
Value City Arena at the Jerome Schottenstein Center
555 Borror Dr
Columbus, OH 43210-1187
The Ohio State University
Columbus Arena Management
17,500 (ice hockey)
19,500 (basketball)
20,000+ (concerts)[1]
March 2, 1996
November 3, 1998
Sink Combs Dethlefs
Moody Nolan
Korda/Nemeth Engineering Inc.
P.J. Dick, Inc.[4]
It is home to Ohio State Buckeyes men's basketball, women's basketball and men's ice hockey teams. Previously, the basketball teams played at St. John Arena, while the ice hockey team played at the OSU Ice Arena. The facility is named the Jerome Schottenstein Center in honor of Jerome Schottenstein, of Columbus, late founder of Schottenstein Stores Corp. and lead benefactor of the project, while the seating bowl is named for Schottenstein's store Value City Furniture.
Relationship to Nationwide Arena[edit]
Prior to July 1, 2010, one of Value City Arena's major event competitors was the downtown Nationwide Arena, which opened in 2000 and is home to the NHL's Columbus Blue Jackets. In May 2010, the Blue Jackets and OSU signed a one-year, annually renewable, agreement to turn over day-to-day operations and non-athletic event booking of Nationwide Arena to OSU, effective July 1, 2010.[6] This agreement put both arenas under the same management and made the facilities sister venues. As part of the March 2012 sale of Nationwide Arena to the Franklin County Convention Facilities Authority (FCCFA), the non-profit company Columbus Arena Management was created. The company, created by OSU, the Blue Jackets, the FCCFA and Columbus-based Nationwide Insurance, currently manages the day-to-day operations as well as budgeting and event bookings at both arenas.[7]
Rankings[edit]
A 2016 ranking of toughest Big Ten arenas to play in by ESPN put Value City Arena tenth out of fourteen in the conference, citing its name as a contributing factor for not being tough.[9] In 2014, a ranking of Big Ten conference arenas by the Chicago Tribune placed it at #11,[10] and Scout.com put it at #99 overall out of 351 venues nationwide, behind Ohio University's Convocation Center, which was ranked #53, and the University of Dayton Arena, ranked at #28.[11] Bleacher Report has called the arena too "generic" for the most expensive tickets in the conference,[12] and The Gazette has opined it is "sterile", "cold", "devoid of charm", and lacks intimacy.[13]