Roanoke Civic Center
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Berglund Center (originally called the Roanoke Civic Center) is a 10,500-seat multi-purpose
arena An arena is a large enclosed venue, often circular or oval-shaped, designed to showcase theatre, Music, musical performances or Sport, sporting events. It comprises a large open space surrounded on most or all sides by tiered seating for specta ...
located in the
Williamson Road Williamson Road is an approximately 8.0 mi (12.9 km) long road in Roanoke City and Roanoke County, Virginia. The road runs from downtown Roanoke in the south through the Botetourt County line in the north. For the majority of its length Willi ...
neighborhood of
Roanoke, Virginia Roanoke ( ) is an Independent city (United States), independent city in Virginia, United States. It lies in Southwest Virginia, along the Roanoke River, in the Blue Ridge Mountains, Blue Ridge range of the greater Appalachian Mountains. Roanok ...
. It was built in 1971 and is currently the home of the Roanoke Rail Yard Dawgs of the
SPHL The SPHL (formerly the Southern Professional Hockey League) is a professional ice hockey independent minor league based in Huntersville, North Carolina, with teams located primarily in the southeastern United States as well as Illinois and India ...
. The arena also hosts
Virginia Tech The Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, commonly referred to as Virginia Tech (VT), is a Public university, public Land-grant college, land-grant research university with its main campus in Blacksburg, Virginia, United States ...
,
Radford University Radford University is a public university in Radford, Virginia, United States. It is one of the state's eight doctorate-granting public universities. Founded in 1910, Radford offers curricula for undergraduates in more than 100 fields, graduate ...
and
Roanoke College Roanoke College is a Private university, private Liberal arts colleges in the United States, liberal arts college in Salem, Virginia. It has approximately 2,000 students who represent approximately 40 states and 30 countries. The college offers ...
men's
ice hockey Ice hockey (or simply hockey in North America) is a team sport played on ice skates, usually on an Ice rink, ice skating rink with Ice hockey rink, lines and markings specific to the sport. It belongs to a family of sports called hockey. Tw ...
games, as well as regular concerts and other large indoor events. The arena is also the home of the annual boys basketball games between Roanoke's two city high schools, Patrick Henry High School and William Fleming High School. It was the former home to the
Virginia Squires The Virginia Squires were a basketball team based in Norfolk, Virginia, and playing in several other Virginia cities. They were members of the American Basketball Association from 1970 to 1976. The team originated in 1967 as the Oakland Oaks, a ...
and Roanoke Dazzle
basketball Basketball is a team sport in which two teams, most commonly of five players each, opposing one another on a rectangular Basketball court, court, compete with the primary objective of #Shooting, shooting a basketball (ball), basketball (appro ...
team A team is a group of individuals (human or non-human) working together to achieve their goal. As defined by Professor Leigh Thompson of the Kellogg School of Management, " team is a group of people who are interdependent with respect to in ...
s, the Roanoke Express and Roanoke Valley Vipers
ice hockey Ice hockey (or simply hockey in North America) is a team sport played on ice skates, usually on an Ice rink, ice skating rink with Ice hockey rink, lines and markings specific to the sport. It belongs to a family of sports called hockey. Tw ...
teams, and the Roanoke Steam
arena football Arena football is a variety of gridiron football designed to be played indoors. The game is played on a smaller field than American or Canadian football, designed to fit in the same surface area as a standard North American ice hockey rink, an ...
team.


History

Opened in October 1971, the Roanoke Civic Center was also the former home of the
American Basketball Association The American Basketball Association (ABA) was a major professional basketball league that operated for nine seasons from 1967 to 1976. The upstart ABA operated in direct competition with the more established National Basketball Association thr ...
(1967–1976) professional basketball franchise
Virginia Squires The Virginia Squires were a basketball team based in Norfolk, Virginia, and playing in several other Virginia cities. They were members of the American Basketball Association from 1970 to 1976. The team originated in 1967 as the Oakland Oaks, a ...
. The Squires played there (in addition to the
Norfolk Scope Norfolk Scope is a multi-function complex in Norfolk, Virginia, comprising the 11,000-seat Scope Arena, a 2,500-seat theater known as Chrysler Hall, a modular exhibition hall, and a 600-car parking garage. The arena was designed by Italian arch ...
,
Richmond Coliseum Richmond Coliseum is a defunct arena located in downtown Richmond, Virginia, with a capacity of 13,500 that was most often used for various large concerts. The arena opened in 1971 and the region is looking to replace the aging facility with a la ...
and Hampton Coliseum; all within the state of Virginia) from 1971 to 1972. The Virginia Squires used the Civic Center for only one season due to low attendance, before folding in 1976.
Elvis Presley Elvis Aaron Presley (January 8, 1935 – August 16, 1977) was an American singer and actor. Referred to as the "King of Rock and Roll", he is regarded as Cultural impact of Elvis Presley, one of the most significant cultural figures of the ...
performed there in 1972, 1974, 1976, and was due to return in 1977, about a week after his death. It hosted 251
professional wrestling Professional wrestling, often shortened to either pro wrestling or wrestling,The term "wrestling" is most often widely used to specifically refer to modern scripted professional wrestling, though it is also used to refer to Real life, real- ...
events between 1975 and 2013. WCW held Fall Brawl (1994) there and '' Monday Nitro'' on March 31, 1997.
WWE World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE) is an American professional wrestling promotion. It is owned and operated by TKO Group Holdings, a majority-owned subsidiary of Endeavor Group Holdings. A global integrated media and entertainment company, ...
brought ''
Monday Night Raw ''WWE Raw'', also known as ''Monday Night Raw'' or simply ''Raw'', is an American professional wrestling television program produced by WWE. It currently airs live every Monday at 8 p.m. Eastern Time (ET) on Netflix. The show features character ...
'' on November 25, 1997, May 6, 2013, and November 17, 2014. The 1977–1981
Southern Conference The Southern Conference (SoCon) is a collegiate List of NCAA conferences, athletic conference affiliated with the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) NCAA Division I, Division I. Southern Conference College football, football teams c ...
men's basketball tournaments were held there as well. From 2001 to 2006, professional basketball was active again at the Roanoke Civic Center, with the
National Basketball Association The National Basketball Association (NBA) is a professional basketball league in North America composed of 30 teams (29 in the United States and 1 in Canada). The NBA is one of the major professional sports leagues in the United States and Ca ...
's D-League franchise, the Roanoke Dazzle. College basketball was also recently contested there, in the form of the
Big South Conference The Big South Conference is a collegiate athletic conference affiliated with the NCAA's Division I. Originally a non-football conference, the Big South began sponsoring football in 2002 as part of the Football Championship Subdivision (FCS), ...
men's basketball tournaments in 2001 and 2002. The
Metro Conference The Metropolitan Collegiate Athletic Conference, popularly known as the Metro Conference, was an NCAA Division I athletics conference, so named because its six charter members were all in urban metropolitan areas, though its later members di ...
men's basketball tournament was held here in 1991. The
Southern Conference The Southern Conference (SoCon) is a collegiate List of NCAA conferences, athletic conference affiliated with the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) NCAA Division I, Division I. Southern Conference College football, football teams c ...
basketball tournament took place at the arena between 1977 and 1981. When both the Dazzle and Vipers folded after the 2005–06 season, the Roanoke Civic Center was left with 60 open dates to fill for the upcoming fall and winter. Eventually, nearly two-thirds of these open dates were awarded to the Virginia Tech, Radford University and Roanoke College hockey clubs, the arena's primary tenants until 2016, when the
Mississippi Surge The Mississippi Surge were a professional hockey team in the Southern Professional Hockey League that began play in the 2009–10 season and folded on May 2, 2014. Playing for five seasons, the Surge was based in Biloxi, Mississippi, Biloxi and h ...
relocated to Roanoke, becoming the Rail Yard Dawgs. In May 2023, the Berglund Center hosted games three and four of the
Southern Professional Hockey League The SPHL (formerly the Southern Professional Hockey League) is a professional ice hockey independent minor league based in Huntersville, North Carolina, with teams located primarily in the southeastern United States as well as Illinois and Indian ...
finals, both won by the hometown Rail Yard Dawgs over the Birmingham Bulls, clinching the Dawgs first championship.


Overview

Built at the same time as the Scope and Richmond Coliseum, the Roanoke Civic Center is the area's premier sports and entertainment venue. There are eight restrooms and six concession stands at the arena, which has a ceiling height and 10 spotlights as well as a portable stage that is no larger than 60-by-40 feet. There are 8,372 permanent seats at the arena; the arena floor measures over . The Eclipse forms the Coliseum's half-house configuration. The arena recently began a $6.2 million renovation project expected to last until 2016. The arena's heating system has been replaced, and plans call for upgrades to the arena's electrical system and to all arena entrances, as well as for all seats to be replaced. Adjacent are a exhibit hall with of column-free space, and a 2,440-seat theatre that can be used for concerts, Broadway shows, the Roanoke Symphony Orchestra and other special events. The theatre features a -by-105-foot stage; 1,625 seats in the theatre are in the orchestra level, 295 in the loge and 520 in the balcony. After recent renovations, the facility became known as the Roanoke Performing Arts Theatre. A special events center was added to the Civic Center in 2007; it is used for trade shows, meetings, conventions and other special events. It can hold up to 3,066 seated, 5,850 standing. The ceiling height is 32 feet.


Professional sports teams

*
Virginia Squires The Virginia Squires were a basketball team based in Norfolk, Virginia, and playing in several other Virginia cities. They were members of the American Basketball Association from 1970 to 1976. The team originated in 1967 as the Oakland Oaks, a ...
,
American Basketball Association The American Basketball Association (ABA) was a major professional basketball league that operated for nine seasons from 1967 to 1976. The upstart ABA operated in direct competition with the more established National Basketball Association thr ...
(1971–1976) * Roanoke Express,
East Coast Hockey League The ECHL (formerly the East Coast Hockey League) is a minor professional ice hockey league based in Shrewsbury, New Jersey, with teams across the United States and Canada. Competitively, it is a tier below the American Hockey League (AHL). The ...
(1993–2004) * Roanoke Steam,
AF2 The AF2 (often styled as af2, and short for arenafootball2) was the Arena Football League's developmental league; it was founded in 1999 and played its first season in 2000. Like its parent AFL, the AF2 played using the same arena football r ...
(2000–2002) * Roanoke Dazzle,
NBA G League The NBA G League, or simply the G League, is a professional basketball league in North America that serves as the Minor league#Basketball, developmental league of the National Basketball Association (NBA). The league comprises 31 teams; as of ...
(2001–2006) * Roanoke Valley Vipers,
United Hockey League The United Hockey League (UHL), originally known as the Colonial Hockey League from 1991 to 1997 and last known as the International Hockey League from 2007 to 2010, was a low-level minor professional ice hockey league, with teams in the Unite ...
(2005–2006) * Roanoke Rail Yard Dawgs,
Southern Professional Hockey League The SPHL (formerly the Southern Professional Hockey League) is a professional ice hockey independent minor league based in Huntersville, North Carolina, with teams located primarily in the southeastern United States as well as Illinois and Indian ...
(2016–present)


References


External links

* {{Authority control 1971 establishments in Virginia American Basketball Association venues Buildings and structures in Roanoke, Virginia College basketball venues in Virginia Convention centers in Virginia Ice hockey venues in Virginia Roanoke Dazzle Sports in Roanoke, Virginia Virginia Squires Tourist attractions in Roanoke, Virginia Sports venues completed in 1971 College ice hockey venues in the United States Indoor arenas in Virginia