Me too, went there as a kid, but dont have that many memories of the joint....

I remember the flat wooden benches instead of seats. About as comfortable as sitting at Pasadena or Wayville these days.

Isaac those flat wooden benches were only the cheap seats - near the back or at the scoreboard end.

Suppose you don't get rich enough to own a Ferrari by splashing out on comfortable tickets to the basketball

Unfortunately the Rocket Scientists (at the time) at BASA "destroyed" most of the memorabilia prior to moving to the Dome (Powerhouse). In their opinion the history of basketball in SA was not really relevant compared to making money (which they now don't have). Any photos etc available are probably in the hands of individuals who care about basketball in this state.

Isaac you must have been in the cheap seats, middle class were the orange school chairs screwed into the bench was where i sat. i was always jealous of those fat cats that got to sit in the old leather theatre chairs behind the benches.

I have no memories of the stadium either, all before my time and before I feel in love with the game of basketball.

When I feel in love all I get is a slap in the face...

I know Colin Thompson managed to collect a heap of the old info and photo's before it was thrown out.
If anyone really wants old information, get hold of Colin through BSA, I am sure he will help.

Leather seats behind the sixers bench in 86.

Just great.

So the answer is no? No photos?

I know someone who took the old brass gates before it was demolished.

What about the seats that were squashed up against the roof at the back - remember playing curtain raisers and getting the cheap seats up there....also the big red curtain at the base line

Please excuse shocking photo, but here's a old photo circa 1992. Just after basketball moved out and the church moved in.



Any other old photos would be great to see also,once again i apologize for the shocking pic,hope it gives people a idea.

I was playing there for United Church (now Sturt)in the summer of 1970 - we won the summer grand final there against West Adelaide. There are photos of that game (and the stadium) in the Sturt clubroom still.

There were old movie theatre seats for the first 3-4 rows opposite the score bench, and my Dad helped install many of the orange plastic seats behind and around the rest of the stadium.
Very early in the peace, a stage was installed at the southern end and quite a few orange seats had to be removed for that. It was said the capacity went from 5000 to about 4200 when that happened.

I don't know whether the Adevertiser archives would still have photos - they were photos taken by 'The News' reporters and the Advertiser bought that paper out.
PS that Grand Final game was televised!

ANON 12- they were'nt all destroyed some of the smart staff who had an interest back in 1998 managed to put the photos in a safe place with our 'unofficial' history committee- -we could see that some people within the place had their own agenda's and not an interest in basketball - which i guess is why they transported it from Apollo to Dome in Green Garbage Bags and threw it into a storeroom. We bought in some of the old school such as Ray Wood, Scott Davies and Arthur Newley to identify and name the photos and old uniforms and then Teresa, Colin and I got them stored in the SA Historic Library - and thank goodness we did cause their was an even bigger cleanout when the Government stepped in.

So a little piece of mind I suppose!

I went to several concerts at Apollo Stadium, but only one game. I was invited into a 'corporate box' which turned out to be half a dozen of the orange seats on the corner, and on each seat was a sticky label with the company's name in texta on the label.
Had crappy fried finger food, met some players afterwards but I can't remember who they were, who they played or what the result was.

That pic brings back some memories indeed.

Some of the greats that played there that i got to see:

George Gervin and Johnny Moore both Spurs players that have had their number retired

The 87/88 Russian means team with Sabonis, Volkov and more in full glory

The hot dogs that were more butter than meat...mmm

Scott Ninnis going for 40 plus in the state league grand final

John Wesleys last game

Al Green kicking a ball into the ceiling causing one of those plaster panels to fall down and smash into powder on the court which them took about 30 minutes to clean

One of the Daltons smashing the backboard in warm up of a Kings game.

Darryl Pearce hitting a finger roll on the buzzer which was disallowed beacuse the corwd was so loud the refs could not hear the buzzer. ( that is why we now have the lights on the back boards)

i could go on an on.

I remember that Russian team warming up. They started off so slow, almost walking in their lay-up drill. But they got faster and slicker gradually and the last 30 sec of warm-up was full pace and they hit everything. Very impressive team.

My first ever game was against Brisbane. When we entered the stadium, I got a ticket to come down at half-time for a foul shooting competition. I won a signed ball (the 1986 championship team) and an Alfa Romeo keyring. Still got both.

I also remember the nose bleed seats, if you were tall, you'd hit your head when standing up!

Another great memory was getting paid $5 to wipe the floor at a Buffalos game, Ninnis dominated and was only just coming off the bench for the Sixers.

Keep going kent and phizzer, good stuff.

ok then

The last game both official and unofficial. Official losing to the Wildcats in a final and the unofficial with all the state league import up against the full sixers squad.

Imports in that one game were

Kelvin Henderson
Tyrone Lee
Willie Jennette ( little known fact about Willie is that he features in a Nike Poster called Shirts N Skins where he is pictured blocking Jordan in a pick up game. I would have retired right there)
Andree La Fleur ( Pre tearing up the Gold Coast)
Dave Hockabout
Tim Hatchett ( who 360 dunked on Bradtke BTW...yes it was sick watching a 6'3 guy posterise the best big in Australia)
Lester Fonville
Ron Nunnelly
Dwayne Cross and i think Harold McMath.

That little bastard Bobby Locke playing his first game in the NBL at Apollo he went from being laughed at for being so short to oh crap he just dunked in warm up to dropping 50 plus on us for Geelong

Al Green and Cal Bruton man handling each other all night in the 87 decider and the refs letting each other play , awesome.

Ken Coles reception first game back as coach of Newcastle.

The "We're in the playoffs" chant that rang out for what seemed 10 minutes once it was clear we had won the last game we needed to steal the last playoff spot.

Bradtke being booed and told to get a hair cut cause his mullet was tradgic when he first played FOR the sixers.