The Verizon Wireless Center is a 5,280-seat (8,200 for concerts) multi-purpose arena

Arena

An arena is an enclosed area, often circular or oval-shaped, designed to showcase theater, musical performances, or sporting events. It is composed of a large open space surrounded on most or all sides by tiered seating for spectators. The key feature of an arena is that the event space is the...

, in Mankato, Minnesota

Mankato, Minnesota

Mankato is a city in Blue Earth, Nicollet, and Le Sueur counties in the U.S. state of Minnesota. The population was 39,309 at the 2010 census, making it the fourth largest city in Minnesota outside of the Minneapolis-St. Paul metropolitan area. The county seat of Blue Earth County, it is located...

, built in 1995.

It is home to the Minnesota State University

Minnesota State University, Mankato

Minnesota State University, Mankato is a public four-year university located in Mankato, Minnesota, a community of 53,000 located southwest of Minneapolis-St. Paul. As of Fall 2011, the student body is the third-largest in the state of Minnesota with over 15,000 students...

 Mavericks ice hockey

Ice hockey

Ice hockey, often referred to as hockey, is a team sport played on ice, in which skaters use wooden or composite sticks to shoot a hard rubber puck into their opponent's net. The game is played between two teams of six players each. Five members of each team skate up and down the ice trying to take...

 team and hosts musical performances and other events.

Prior to the building of the arena, MSU played their home games at All Seasons Arena

All Seasons Arena

There are two All Seasons Arenas*All Seasons Arena *All Seasons Arena...

, built in 1974, which is now their main practice facility.

The arena's naming sponsor is Verizon Wireless

Verizon Wireless

Cellco Partnership, doing business as Verizon Wireless, is one of the largest mobile network operators in the United States. The network has 107.7 million subscribers as of 2011, making it the largest wireless service provider in America....

, one of America's

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 major wireless phone

Mobile phone

A mobile phone is a device which can make and receive telephone calls over a radio link whilst moving around a wide geographic area. It does so by connecting to a cellular network provided by a mobile network operator...

 companies.

In 1998, locally headquartered phone company Midwest Wireless

Midwest Wireless

Midwest Wireless was a wireless telephone company serving southern Minnesota, northern Iowa and western Wisconsin in the United States. The company served roughly 400,000 customers and used CDMA phone technology....

 purchased naming rights to the Civic Center. With Alltel's

Alltel

Alltel Corporation is a wireless service provider, primarily based in the United States. Before an acquisition by Verizon Wireless, it served 34 states. After the merger, Alltel continues to serve six states, mostly in rural areas...

 acquisition

Mergers and acquisitions

Mergers and acquisitions refers to the aspect of corporate strategy, corporate finance and management dealing with the buying, selling, dividing and combining of different companies and similar entities that can help an enterprise grow rapidly in its sector or location of origin, or a new field or...

 of Midwest Wireless, the facility's name was officially changed in July 2007. Alltel paid $110,000 per year for naming rights. The name changed in 2009 after Alltel was purchased by Verizon Wireless.

The south side of the complex incorporates the restored exterior of the First National Bank of Mankato, a 1913 Prairie School

Prairie School

Prairie School was a late 19th and early 20th century architectural style, most common to the Midwestern United States.The works of the Prairie School architects are usually marked by horizontal lines, flat or hipped roofs with broad overhanging eaves, windows grouped in horizontal bands,...

 building.

Events

Primarily, the Center hosts hockey games, concerts and conventions.

Notable events include the following: KISS

KISS (band)

Kiss is an American rock band formed in New York City in January 1973. Well-known for its members' face paint and flamboyant stage outfits, the group rose to prominence in the mid to late 1970s on the basis of their elaborate live performances, which featured fire breathing, blood spitting,...

, Disturbed, Three Days Grace

Three Days Grace

Three Days Grace is a Canadian rock band, formed in Norwood, Ontario, Canada in 1992, originally under the name Groundswell. After a breakup in late 1997, the band regrouped in the same year under its current name and with a line-up consisting of guitarist and lead vocalist Adam Gontier, drummer...

, Bob Dylan

Bob Dylan

Bob Dylan is an American singer-songwriter, musician, poet, film director and painter. He has been a major and profoundly influential figure in popular music and culture for five decades. Much of his most celebrated work dates from the 1960s when he was an informal chronicler and a seemingly...

, Jeff Dunham

Jeff Dunham

Jeff Dunham is an American ventriloquist and stand-up comedian who has also appeared on numerous television shows, including Late Show with David Letterman, Comedy Central Presents, The Tonight Show and Sonny With a Chance...

, Jason Aldean

Jason Aldean

Jason Aldine Williams is an American country music singer, known professionally as Jason Aldean. Since 2005, Aldean has recorded for Broken Bow Records, an independent record label for which he has released four albums and twelve singles...

, Dierks Bentley

Dierks Bentley

Dierks Bentley is an American country music artist who has been signed to Capitol Records Nashville since 2003. That year, he released his self-titled debut album. Both it and its follow-up, 2005's Modern Day Drifter, are certified platinum in the United States. A third album, 2006's Long Trip...

, Styx

Styx

In Greek mythology the Styx is the river that forms the boundary between the underworld and the world of the living, as well as a goddess and a nymph that represents the river.Styx may also refer to:-Popular culture:...

, REO Speedwagon

REO Speedwagon

REO Speedwagon is an American rock band. Formed in 1967, the band grew in popularity during the 1970s and peaked in the early 1980s. Hi Infidelity is the group's most commercially successful album, selling over ten million copies and charting four Top 40 hits in the US...

, Weird Al Yankovic, WWE Live, TNA

Total Nonstop Action Wrestling

Total Nonstop Action Wrestling is a privately held professional wrestling promotion founded by Jeff Jarrett and Jerry Jarrett. The company broadcasts its events on television and the Internet fifty two weeks a year with over a million weekly viewers on its primary television program, Impact...

 live, Disney Live and Monster Jam

Monster Jam

Monster Jam is a live motorsport event tour and television show operated by Feld Entertainment. The series is sanctioned under the umbrella of the United States Hot Rod Association and takes place primarily in the United States and around the world...

, which comes every two years.

External links

• Verizon Wireless Center - official site