One trip to the Central Intercollegiate Athletic Association Tournament in February, and they were sold. Position Sports, a marketing firm on a 10-year lease to operate Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame events, had an eye on Baltimore as one possible host site for their 2024 college basketball series. So they sent some folks to CFG Bank Arena for the most recent CIAA Tournament to get a lay of the land, a chance to see for themselves the ebb and flow of the only major college hoops event on Baltimore’s calendar.
“Everything that we saw looked like a great opportunity for us,” president of Position Sports Melissa Meacham-Grossman told The Baltimore Sun. Friday night, it came to life. CFG Bank Arena hosted a doubleheader of four high-major programs — Virginia vs.
Villanova, then Penn State vs. Virginia Tech. It’s the first of a two-year agreement between the Hall of Fame, Visit Baltimore and Maryland Sports Commission president Terry Hasseltine to come back to N Howard and W Baltimore Streets.
In Hasseltine’s eyes, the timing seemed to align perfectly. CFG Bank Arena broke ground on a $250 million renovation in 2022 that wrapped and officially opened by February 2023. It included hospitality areas, an adjusted seating bowl and more money funneled into giving the arena a facelift — all conducive to hosting basketball, he said.
“That’s why the Hall of Fame knocked on the door.” Those conversations started a year ago. They landed on Charm City in the spring.
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