First Night, the annual first look at the University of Connecticut men’s and women’s basketball teams has been canceled for this year, according to a statement issued by the athletic department Friday.
“Due to ongoing renovations at Gampel Pavilion designed to enhance the game-day experience, UConn's annual First Night basketball event will not be held in 2025. The UConn Huskies look forward to seeing our students and fans out in force in the Basketball Capital of the World this season,” the statement read, as reported by Roger Cleaveland of CTInsider.
Athletic director David Benedict told members of the media that the renovations will be completed by the start of the 2025-26 season.
“There is a lot of talk about Gampel as the basketball season is rapidly approaching,” Benedict said. “Here on campus we are getting close to finishing up the lower-level seating replacement. We are very excited about that getting done. There should not be any issue relative to that work being complete prior to the season.
“The one big opportunity is — those were basically fully telescopic seats previously — we have added a lot of permanent structure to the lower level. The reason we did that is we are trying to create more space in a building that is very challenged with space, not just for our fans, but for our student-athletes and for every aspect of what we try to do on game day.”
Per Cleaveland's reporting, Benedict said that by building permanent seating structures at Gampel, they created an extra 3,000 feet of new space under the stands for locker rooms, meeting rooms and training rooms.
“On the other side, it is going to give us a lot more space to create clubs, training tables and things of that nature which will support our student-athletes and fans on game day. So, we are extremely excited about that in addition to the work going on at People’s Bank Arena,” he said, as reported by CTInsider.
First Night, typically held in mid-October, has been "a popular event that allowed Husky Nation to get a taste of how talented the teams will be and get a glimpse into player personalities with elaborate introductions, laid-back fun scrimmages and other contests," Cleaveland wrote.
Instead, both the men's and women's teams will each play Boston College at Mohegan Sun Arena in Hall of Fame exhibition games.
While Gampel Pavilion will be able to host regular-season games, full renovation of the facility will not be completed until 2027, Benedict said.
“We are also in the process of finishing our plan development for the rest of renovations at Gampel,” he said. “I would say in the next two to three months, we will be able to present that as far as everything else we plan on doing here over the next two years. The work will be finished in 2027. This is not going to take forever.”
