Jim Norick Arena hosting its final state basketball tournament before demolition

OKLAHOMA CITY (KFOR) — The state basketball tournament is underway for the final time at the Jim Norick Arena. It marks one last go-around for the “Big House” before it is set to be demolished this spring.

After six decades, the building will give way to moving next door in the brand new OKC Coliseum.

Cheers were bouncing off the walls in the Mecca of state championship basketball in the Sooner state on Wednesday, just as they have since 1965.

"You know, it's just a mystique to it,” Assistant Director of the Oklahoma Secondary School Activities Association, OSSAA, Brian Lester said. “I mean, I think because of so many memories and tradition with it."

Lester oversees small school basketball for the OSSAA. For him and a lot of others, this last year is quite bittersweet.

"Every time I talk about it, it's emotional,” Lester said.

He watched his son play there in 2015. The ring he had on his finger indicates his own history on the court there to. He won a state title as the Tuttle girls basketball coach in 2021.

"Lifting that championship ball, that's pretty special,” he said.

"It's just a totally different game here,” said former Dover girls basketball player, Keshia Holmes.

Holmes is another big name in the arena. She helped put her hometown of Dover on the map in the early 2000s.

"She's the best Dover athlete we ever had. Three state championships. Right there,” said a man who walked up during the News 4 interview with Holmes.

KFOR sports reporter and anchor, Van Shea Iven, covered one of her three state title games at the Jim Norick Arena back in 2002.

"In class B, Dover is trying to play their way into the record books, by becoming the first team to ever win three straight five on five girls state championships,” he said in his story. “Keshia Holmes made sure that Dover was once again the queens of class B as they three peat, 53 to 41."

"We wasn't going home losing. That's for sure,” said Holmes.

On Wednesday, she was in the crowd watching her son compete for the same school and in the same place she did two decades ago.

Demolition may be in the plans for the historic place. However, the good memories will linger around forever.