Massari Arena

Coordinates: 38°18′34″N 104°34′32″W / 38.309517°N 104.575499°W / 38.309517; -104.575499

Massari Arena is a 5,000 seat multi-purpose arena in Pueblo, Colorado. It was built in 1971. It is the home of the Colorado State University-Pueblo ThunderWolves basketball teams.

Outside of sports, the arena is perhaps most noted as the site of a 1980 Van Halen concert that provided the backdrop for an enduring urban legend surrounding the band. The band's technical rider stated that concert organizers had to supply a bowl of M&M's backstage, with all brown pieces removed. In the wake of the concert, media reports indicated that the band caused $85,000 of damage to the arena after noticing brown M&M's. In his autobiography, lead singer David Lee Roth told a different story—he admitted to doing $12,000 in damage backstage, but indicated that over $80,000 of damage had been done to the arena's newly installed basketball floor because it could not support the band's extremely heavy staging.^[1]

References