According to Wikipedia, “"Flood the zone" is a political strategy in which a political figure aims to gain media attention, disorient opponents and distract the public from undesirable reports by rapidly forwarding large volumes of newsworthy information to the media.” The college sports world has been inundated in graphs, all of them bleak. Through Wurster Hall this week, we’re going to “flood the zone” with what I consider good graphs. Let’s jump right in and learn about UNLV in the process!
Allegiant Stadium - Toilet Valhalla
For many Cal Fans visiting Allegiant Stadium, this will be the first time witnessing the glory and splendor of the San Francisco Los Angeles Oakland Las Vegas Raiders new stadium. Cal of course was supposed to open up the stadium alongside UNLV in 2020 way back on August 29th and that’s enough about that!
I am sad that us fans never got to stress test it, much like they did back in June 2020. I never realized this was a significant part of game day operations for a team, but you learn something new every day! Anyways, that led me to discover Allegiant Stadium has a whopping 297 restrooms with nearly 1400 toilets! Wow! What a feat of engineering. But I’ll take the 90+ Stadium Rim Porta Potty’s every couple Saturdays thank you.
The History of Concrete
Next, we’ll jump in to stadium construction. Allegiant Stadium was of course completed in 2020 while California Memorial Stadium was built in 1922. California Memorial Stadium used approximately 50,000 cubic yards of concrete to build the stadium while Allegiant required double that at 105,000 cub yards of concrete, which according to their website “is enough to pave a sidewalk from Los Angeles to Las Vegas”. What an odd measurement! But you have to give the edge here to Cal, being efficient with the public dollars!
All Hail The Sphere
Next we take a look at a critical statistic, namely quite literally how our QBs stack up. As a comparison, we’ll use the neutral Vegas Sphere (The Wizard Of Oz is playing if you’re so inclined.) The Sphere itself measures in at 366 feet or 4,392 inches. UNLV QB Jackson Arnold measures in at a whopping 73 inches, meaning you would need approximately 60 of him plus his shin and feet to equal one Vegas Sphere, while Cal QB Jaron-Keawe Sagapolutele at 75 inches comes in at an efficient 58 Jaron’s and then approximately 1/2 of him. That my friends is what we call efficiency, and you love to see it in a QB.
Age Is But A Number
We move now now to discuss the age of each university in the year of our Oski, 2026. UC Berkeley was of course chartered in 1868 and is currently in its 158th year of existence. UNLV was chartered in 1957 and is currently celebrating their 69th birthday. Here’s a list of things that are older than UNLV.
Oski Bear (85)
Tom Hanks (70)
Play-Doh (70)
10 of UC Berkeley’s Nobel Prizes
The Closest Bear Is…Holy Cow Los Angeles?
Friends I researched this one extensively and as near as I can tell, the nearest Bear to the University of Nevada, Las Vegas is indeed the same Bear that is the closest to the University of California, Los Angeles. I tell you I was shocked to uncover this statistic, a whopping 271 miles from campus to the LA Zoo. I’m not sure what this means, but it can’t be a good sign right?
Well friends, that’s this week sampling of relevant statistics and graphs. I have to say, I feel a lot better now compared to Monday facing the onslaught of analytics. While I’m bummed I’ll miss the game on the plane, I’m looking forward to landing and see our victorious California Golden Bears come Saturday. Thanks for reading, and Go Bears!
My game neutral note is that I saw U2 at the Sphere a couple of years ago, and despite it being the most expensive concert ticket of my life, I felt like it was well worth the spend.
Great article that failed to compare alternative disparaging acronyms of the two universities. Whereas there is no disparaging acronym for the name of the flagship school of California, and No. 1 University in the world, which is “California,” UNLV has two: University of No Lasting Value and U Never Leave Vegas (which although I remain a rare exception to the latter, is the case for the rest of my native born Vegas family who hate and complain about it constantly but up to this point have done nothing about it despite having decades of adulthood to do so).
California- 0
UNLV -2