Gainbridge Fieldhouse

• 1. Introduction

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  Gainbridge Fieldhouse opened on the 6th of November 1999, with the Indiana Pacers hosting the Boston Celtics in the building's first NBA game. The arena replaced Market Square Arena. Downtown Indianapolis now had something rare in North American sports: a professional venue built to stand apart from every other one in the league. That ambition shaped everything that followed, from the feel of the seats to the building's reputation across the decades. What makes one arena genuinely different from all the others? How does a building keep its standing through corporate sponsors that come and go? Architecture firm Ellerbe Becket had a specific mandate, and the answers begin with how they chose to build.

• 2. A Basketball-First Blueprint

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  Ellerbe Becket designed the facade to evoke Indiana's classic high school and college field houses. Brick and glass replaced the glass-and-steel look common to modern arenas. That visual choice signaled something more fundamental. Unlike most arenas in North American professional sports, this one was built primarily for basketball. The corners of the seating bowl reach toward the baseline, pulling fans closer to the court than most configurations allow. The building can accommodate an NHL-sized rink, but when hockey is staged, the asymmetrical seating arrangement reduces capacity to 12,500. In 2022, sportswriter Bill Simmons called Gainbridge Fieldhouse 'incredible.' He said it was the only NBA arena where he had felt a genuine physical difference, 'because they built it for basketball only.' 'It feels like the fans are on top of the court,' he added. The building Ellerbe Becket delivered opened under the first of three corporate names it would carry over the following two decades.

• 3. Three Names, One Arena

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  Conseco was a financial services organization based in the Indianapolis suburb of Carmel. Its name went on the building from the day it opened. In May 2010, Conseco restructured and renamed itself CNO Financial Group. The fieldhouse kept the Conseco name despite that corporate change. CNO made a more sweeping revision in December 2011, renaming the arena Bankers Life Fieldhouse after one of its subsidiaries, Bankers Life and Casualty. CNO's naming sponsorship expired on the 30th of June 2019, and the company chose not to renew. The building operated without a title sponsor until the 27th of September 2021, when Indianapolis-based financial platform Gainbridge signed a multi-year partnership to take on the naming rights. The arena's calendar filled rapidly with events that went well beyond a normal NBA season.

• 4. Nights That Mattered

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  Games 3, 4, and 5 of the 2000 NBA Finals were played on the fieldhouse floor. The visiting team was the Los Angeles Lakers. The Pacers lost the title four games to two. Two years later, the 2002 FIBA World Championship brought global basketball to Indianapolis, with the semifinals and the final played there. The arena also became a regular home for the Big Ten Conference basketball tournament. From 2002 to 2007, the men's event alternated between the fieldhouse and the United Center in Chicago. From 2008 to 2012, the fieldhouse hosted it exclusively. On the women's side, the Indiana Fever hosted the 2009 WNBA Finals, facing the Phoenix Mercury in games 3 and 4, but lost the series. Three years later, the Fever returned to the WNBA Finals. In 2012, they hosted games 3 and 4 against the Minnesota Lynx and claimed the championship. In 2025, the NBA Finals returned to Indianapolis. The Pacers hosted games 3, 4, and 6 of the 2025 championship, but lost four games to three. The fieldhouse had also drawn events that had nothing to do with basketball or the teams that called it home.

• 5. A Pool in an Arena

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  A 300,000-gallon competition pool appeared on the arena floor in October 2004. The occasion was the 2004 FINA Short Course World Swimming Championships. Alongside it, organizers installed a 174,000-gallon warm-up pool. Over four days of competition, 71,659 tickets were sold. On October 11, the closing session drew 11,488 people. That crowd set a record for the largest audience at any U.S. Swimming event held outside the Olympics. Beyond swimming, the fieldhouse proved willing to host almost anything. In 2015, the Indy Invitational brought midget car racing and outlaw kart racing to a dirt track laid across the arena floor. World Championship Wrestling staged its PPV event Sin at the building in 2001. Concerts filled the schedule from almost the first week. Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band performed on the 10th of November 1999, four days after the first NBA game. On the 11th of March 2019, Metallica set a new attendance record for the venue, drawing 18,274 people. The previous mark belonged to Billy Joel, who had drawn 16,594. That same calendar year, the building's owners and city officials were planning its most significant transformation yet.

• 6. A $360 Million Commitment

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  The Indiana Fever played no home games at Gainbridge Fieldhouse during 2020 or 2021. The renovation had displaced the team for two full WNBA seasons. The project, approved by the Marion County Capital Improvement Board in April 2019, carried a price tag of $360 million. Construction moved through two phases, with nearly all work scheduled during the Pacers' offseasons. In part of 2022, the Fever played home games at Indiana Farmers Coliseum while the final construction wrapped up. The renovated arena, finished in late 2022, gained a new outdoor entry plaza, new indoor gathering areas, and improvements throughout the interior. A scoreboard upgrade had come a decade earlier. In 2012, twin 1080p high-definition video screens were installed, each 50 feet long and 21 feet high. The screens extended nearly from foul line to foul line. The Indiana Pacers committed to remaining in Indianapolis for at least 25 more years as part of the renovation agreement. In 2006, Farrell and Kulyk concluded their project, The Ultimate Sports Road Trip. The pair had personally visited all 122 franchises across the four major professional sports leagues. They named the fieldhouse the best of the best. 'Everything about Conseco Fieldhouse is top notch,' they said, 'a sparkling venue in a sparkling city.'