No ESPNZone and No ESPN Make Pun City Go Crazy

Continuing the Pun City trip, and in doing so, continuing March 12th. This blog had tickets to 4 women's games for the rest of the day, but hadn't been to Las Vegas before, so this blog wanted to check in to its hotel and check out the city for the evening.

Getting to the hotel was a little challenging. Mapquest routed this blog uniquely, to say the least. This blog ended up out in the middle of nowhere, passing an enormous junkyard until eventually getting some good directions from a gas station.

Pun City checked in fairly uneventfully, then headed back to the strip to check out some casinos. This blog had heard that the best sports book was at the Bellagio, and Pun City also wanted to check out the ESPNZone at New York, New York.

The Bellagio was alright, except this blog didn't get chips or tickets for cheap slots so it had to pay for drinks. If this blog had it to do over again, it'd put in some money for chips, then gamble just enough to be able to drink for free. Upon realizing the drinks weren't going to be free and the seats weren't completely comfortable at the Bellagio, this blog thought it'd be better to check out the ESPNZone and maybe get some dinner.

Unfortunately, the ESPNZone was closed for a private party. This was excruciating. Not only was this blog relegated to the lobby to watch Marquette's opening round Big East Tournament game, but there would be no food while watching. Fortunately Marquette won, so this blog decided to head back to the Thomas & Mack Center to watch the remaining women's games (and eat).

There was a definite advantage to coming back for these. First off, there was a new crew working the State Farm stand, so this blog got another wristband and a different pair of flip flops. Also, this blog got to see 4 more teams' bands perform, plus the game action was pretty good too.

The games didn't end until about 1:00 AM though, so this blog was a little out of it. Pun City got back to the hotel and wanted to find out the scores from other conference tournament games. This blog flipped on the TV and searched for sports. The first channel it found was Fox Sports Net, but it had something like "Best Damn Interview Blowups" or something like that, no highlights.

No worries, just switch to ESPN. Wait, where's ESPN? Everyone in the world has ESPN, why isn't it on the directory? How is there no ESPN!? Pun City logs on to their free WiFi, they say they have ESPN, but their site hasn't been updated since last year. Complaining to the front desk's late crew (so you know they're the best crew) revealed they did not have ESPN and hadn't for several months. Per the dude, it was a corporate decision. This blog highly doubts that Days Inn decided on a national level to exclude ESPN. But be forewarned, the North Las Vegas Days Inn doesn't have ESPN. This proved somewhat frustrating when trying to find scores at night, this blog had to rely on the internet or the very few times it would be able to track down The Final Report at night.

Very frustrating to say the least. On a positive note though, the place was easily within walking distance of a Jack-In-The-Box, and the route to the arena had several more Jack-In-The-Boxes plus a couple Del Tacos. Additionally, the room was pretty good with the exception of the TV.

Pun City always took for granted that hotels have ESPN. Let this blog tell you, it really hurts to miss ESPN when on vacation. A station that you can count on to display scores at all hours of the night is a good way to get a connection back home. When on the road, a lot of times the only "local news" you can get from the home front would be the home teams' scores. Since Fox Sports doesn't currently have a permanent "bottom line" similar to ESPN, count this blog as one of what should be many advocates for either ESPN in all hotel rooms, or Fox Sports Net coming up with a permanent score updating somewhere on screen. Let's make it happen!