Business booms during NCAA hoops
Dennis Brinkworth had a good weekend.
Make that a really good weekend.
Owning a bar/restaurant one block away from HSBC Arena helped. So did owning another in Allentown. Both were busier than usual between Thursday and Sunday thanks to first and second round play in the NCAA men's basketball tournament that were in town all weekend.
"You want to know how busy we were," an exhausted Brinkworth said Sunday evening as the a small gathering of NCAA fans were still sipping beers and munching on wings at W.J. Morrisey's, which is one block away from the arena. "We doubled our business on Friday night compared to a regular Sabres' night - and Sabres' nights are pretty good for us. I've been tending bar since 1977 and Friday was probably one of the five busiest days I ever had."
The Buffalo Niagara Convention & Visitors Bureau estimated the economic impact from the games at well north of $5 million. The impact escalated when the Syracuse Orangemen was selected to play their first two games at HSBC Arena.
The heavy influx of Orange fans helped swell the coffers of local bars, hotels and restaurants.
For that matter, so did the legion of the University of West Virginia fans who also trekked to Buffalo to see their beloved Mountaineers payday loan lenders.
While the Pearl Street Brewery was a deep sea of Syracuse orange for much of the weekend, a cadre of several hundred University of Vermont fans, supporters and alumni gathered there Friday evening to watch the Catamount men's hockey team play in Boston- just hours before the university's mens basketball team lost to Syracuse.
"This is the higher stakes games," said Sean Leach, who traveled to Buffalo from the Burlington suburb of Williston to watch the Catamounts. Leach was parading through Pearl Street in a UVM green shirt while holding a beer in one hand and a "Go Cats" Vermont license plate in the other.
Leach said he was impressed with Buffalo's hospitality and the warmth of the people he met.
He was not alone.
Alan Ryea, a 1990 UVM graduate, said he and his fellow 'Cats followers came away impressed with Buffalo. The university has some 800 alumni in the immediate Buffalo Niagara area, noted Ryea, who works in UVM's development office.
"The city threw out the welcome mat for us," Ryea said.
Filed under: money by Finance Boss