Conference USA Basketball Championships adds millions to city coffers

The Von Braun Center crew was still trying to get Propst Arena flipped from hosting a gymnastics meet over the weekend in front of today’s start of college basketball tournaments.

Monday night, on the heels of the “Elevate the Stage’’ gymnastics meet featuring Alabama,  California, North Carolina and Michigan State it looked as if workers had the venue well on the way to ready for the start of the Conference USA Basketball Championships.

The action begins today at 11:30 a.m. with two women’s games, followed by two men’s games set for a 5:30 p.m. start. The games through Thursday in both tournaments will be televised by ESPN+. Friday’s semifinals will be split by CBS Sports Network (CBSSN) broadcasting the men and ESPN+ the women. Saturday’s finals will be carried by CBSSN.

“Last year was a great success for us and we’re looking to build on that,’’ CUSA Commissioner Judy MacLeod said Monday at the VBC.

The city and CUSA entered into a three-year contract to host the tournaments in Huntsville with one year left on the current deal. Last year’s event had a $3.2 million economic impact in the city.

“Depending on what happens with the results (today-Thursday), Friday and Saturday could pick up some more from last year,’’ said Joel Lamp, the sports development manager for the Huntsville-Madison County Convention and Visitors Bureau. “3.2 is kind of a baseline number but as this continues to grow, our economic impact number is gonna grow the more we become a bigger destination to the teams.’’

CUSA added Kennessaw State to the league, putting the field at 10 schools instead of 2024’s nine. They joined Florida International, Jacksonville State, Liberty, Louisiana Tech, Middle Tennessee State (MTSU), New Mexico State, Sam Houston, Texas-El Paso (UTEP) and Western Kentucky.

Defending champions are MTSU for the women and Western Kentucky for the men. Winners get an automatic bid to the NCAA Tournament.

“Last year was awesome and we had schools within driving distance,’’ MacLeod said. “Their fans came out in droves so that was really fantastic. You know, we need to get more of the local community to come out. Our basketball is much improved this year and we’re really looking forward to some great basketball action.’’

Brackets and gametimes can be found at www.conferenceusa.com.