UCLA basketball: Students being moved behind basket at Pauley Pavilion

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UCLA students, who have long enjoyed courtside seats from the baseline to midcourt on one side of the floor in Pauley Pavilion, will be moved behind one basket when the renovated arena opens for the 2012-13 season.

Mark Harlan, senior associate athletic director for external affairs, said the change was made as the result of feedback from students who expressed an interest to be seated together. Under the current configuration, only a few hundred students had courtside seats and the remainder were located in the upper reaches of Pauley Pavilion.

‘The real deal here was the overwhelming desire to all be together, and the way we can do unification is to do it behind the basket,’ Harlan said. ‘To say every student is happy remains to be seen, but the student groups we worked with understood that for it to happen it would have to be in this manner, and they were supportive.’

Students will be allocated 1,900 seats under the new arrangement, an increase of 200 from years past. They will be located behind the west basket on the side adjacent to the visiting team’s bench, span the width of the court and stretch to the top of the arena. The setup is similar to ones used by USC and Arizona.

Athletics officials also announced the return of a single-game student price of $12 for football and basketball games. In recent years, students were sold tickets only on a season basis ($99 for the current academic year) and had to pay the regular fan price for single-game tickets.

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-- Ben Bolch