Home court advantage has as significant a role in college basketball as it does in any other sport. Which teams have the biggest home court advantage?
Basket Under Review’s Brian Rauf attempted to get to the bottom, creating a formula to rank the 25 hardest places to play in the sport. 40% of the formula is based on atmosphere and specifically attendance as a share of capacity. 30% takes into account the win-loss splits for each team in home games compared to road games, 20% comes from mystique which Rauf describes as “reputation, history and intimidation factor.” The final 10% is calculated from the quality of opponents beaten at home.
Where does Tennessee’s Thompson-Boling Arena at Food City Center rank? Rauf’s list pegs TBAaFCC as the 21st toughest place to play in men’s college basketball.
“Everything about Tennessee’s home runs big,” Rauf wrote. “The building, officially known as Thompson-Boling Arena at Food City Center, seats nearly 22,000 — among the largest on-campus arenas in the sport — and under Rick Barnes, the Volunteers have filled it behind a defense-first identity built for a big, loud SEC crowd.
“The orange stretches to the upper deck, and a perennial top-10 program keeps the marquee dates rolling in, even if the sheer scale of the place means it rarely feels as tight as the smaller cauldrons above it.”
Tennessee frequently ranks near the top of the country in annual attendance largely because of the massive capacity. However, that high capacity makes it difficult for the Vols to sell out the arena for non conference buy games.
The Vols have been highly successful at home under Rick Barnes. Tennessee went 14-3 at home last season, is 74-8 at home over the last five years and 152-31 at home in Barnes’ 11 years as head coach. Tennessee has twice gone undefeated at home during Barnes’ tenure, posting a 16-0 record during the 2021-22 season and an 18-0 record during the 2023-24 season.
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Without a rich men’s basketball history, Tennessee is likely docked points for its mystique. The atmosphere is often average for medium tier games but an elite big game environment when all 22,000 fans are locked into the game.
Tennessee got major points for quality of opponents beat. The Vols are 21-10 at home against AP Top 25 teams, 13-5 at home against top 15 teams and 6-0 at home against top five teams at home during Barnes’ tenure.
Thompson-Boling Arena at Food City Center is one of seven SEC arenas in the top 25, coming in behind Arkansas’ Bud Walton Arena (No. 3), Kentucky’s Rupp Arena (No. 7), Alabama’s Coleman Coliseum (No. 12) and Texas’ Moody Center (No. 13) while coming in ahead of Auburn’s Neville Arena (No. 22) and Florida’s Stephen O’Connell Center (No. 24).
Tennessee has also won games at Wisconsin’s Kohl Center (No. 19) and Illinois’ State Farm Center (No. 20) as well as an exhibition at Michigan State’s Breslin Center (No. 8) in recent years. They play at Purdue’s Mackey Arena this coming season.
I’ve covered games at six of the seven SEC arenas ranked excluding the O’Connell Center. The Moody Center was one of the least intimidating environments I’ve witnessed Tennessee play in though Rauf emphasizes that the Longhorns’ home-away splits are very strong and that his ranking takes games at the Erwin Center, where the Longhorns played until 2022, into account.
Coleman Coliseum seems high while Neville Arena seems low to me. However, Alabama is 0-2 in games I’ve covered at Coleman while Auburn is 4-0 in games I’ve covered at Neville which certainly impacts the environments I’ve witnessed.
