Las Vegas has broken through and now Valley sports and tourism leadership need to circle the wagons.
We’ve hosted Super Bowls, Football National Championships, and this week a Final Four. Could the golden days of having mega-events in the Valley be coming to an end?
It’s a very fair question to ask now that our neighbors to the Northwest have been given a NFL franchise. Only a fool would believe that a Super Bowl wouldn’t follow the Raiders to Nevada. The Pac-12, WCC, Mountain West, and WAC all hold their conference basketball tournaments in Vegas. It works on a small level. No reason to believe that Super Bowls, college football title games, Final Fours and more won’t become part of the Vegas landscape at our expense.
What does Phoenix offer that Las Vegas can’t? The Valley is so spread out when it comes to the mega-events, that it’s almost a detriment to what we do here. Las Vegas has the hotels, the Strip, and soon the stadium all in one central location. The new T-Mobile Arena is attached to New York, New York in Vegas. We have nothing like that in Arizona.
The time is NOW for the leaders of our great State to step forward and ramp up their action. Falling out of the loop or losing a Championship bowl game to Las Vegas simply can’t happen.
Brad Cesmat
