My Favorite ARCO Moment: Chris Watkins
Mar 10, 2022, 8:06 AM | Updated: 8:06 am
(Photo by Thearon W. Henderson/Getty Images)
(Photo by Thearon W. Henderson/Getty Images)
Over the next two weeks, Sports 1140 KHTK will be sharing some stories from a variety of personalities that have experienced Sacramento Kings basketball at ARCO Arena.
After a 33-year run–28 years as the home of the Kings–ARCO will be demolished in the coming months to make way for a new California Northstate University medical school and teaching hospital.
The Kings will be holding a farewell event for the arena on Saturday, March 19th. You can find more info here.
Chris Watkins – Video Producer & Host of the Return of the Roar podcast
- What is your favorite ARCO Arena moment?
Being born in 1995, the “Glory Years” (1999-04) took place in my early childhood so while I do have a few memories about going to games during that time and watching the big moments:
The Bibby shot, the Mavericks playoff series–I remember exactly where I was when the *redacted* shot happened in LA. My fondest, most clear memories are that of the Cousins/Malone-era.
My favorite memory was on October 29, 2014, the Sacramento Kings home opener.
It really had nothing to do with the Kings at all, just that they were playing and I was in the arena for the game. What was important though, was what was happening all the way in Kansas City, Missouri at that time: Game 7 of the 2014 World Series between the San Francisco Giants and the Kansas City Royals.
The Madison Bumgarner game.
I will never forget the one-of-a-kind experience it was to have an arena of about 12,000 people and feel like 2/3 of the crowd was paying attention to something happening in a completely different place. Thousands of people following the game from their phones and the TVs on the concourses cheered as if the Kings had just won the NBA Championship as an opposing player took free throws.
It was such a cool, strange moment that I will never forget. I might have shed a tear or two…
- What will you miss most about ARCO Arena?
The energy and sound in that building I believe will forever be unmatched.
It was hard for the arena post-2006 to ever get to the levels of yesteryear, but on the rare occasion, it did. “Pandemonium”, as “The G-Man” likes to say.
The “Here We Stay Night”, “Tyreke at the Horn”, or any Kings vs Lakers game, but specifically the 2011 OT game in what we thought could be the last game ever played in Sacramento, the energy would come back, the floors would literally shake.
Even as the team was in the thick of what would become the longest playoff drought in sports, fans always showed up when it mattered, and the building was the perfect accessory for the memories to be made.
- HBO’s “Winning Time” chronicles the rise of Lakers basketball in the 1980s. Which era of Kings basketball would you choose to see re-created on TV or film?
The Pete D’Alessandro era Kings were a Masterclass of ineptitude from top-to-bottom.
From his weird Gru from “Despicable Me” look, the crowdsourcing a top-10 pick, to the firing of Mike Malone, the incredibly strange 1140 interview, Ty Corbin’s stretch as coach before being cast away for old-crotchety George Karl, to the Karl vs. Cousins relationship, the Chris Mullen behind-the-scenes attempted power grab–and NONE of this is even talking about the on-court product!
