November 12, 2023
Hill Field House (Capacity: 4,250)
Baltimore, MD
Morgan State Bears vs Penn State Wilkes-Barre Nittany Lions
Final Score: 78 – 60
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Kicking off a doubleheader day of college basketball for me was this matinee on the north side of Baltimore. The Charm City is the 30th largest in the country with a population of 621,000 and is located in Northeast Maryland on the Patapsco River (which leads into the Chesapeake Bay). This section of the river forms a harbor around Baltimore and it is this attractive Inner Harbor that defines the city. Located in North Baltimore is the campus of Morgan State University, an HBCU that is heavy in research activity. Their basketball program actually won a National Championship at the Division II level in 1974. They’ve been members of the MEAC for over 40 years as a member of Division I and the Bears have made the NCAA Tournament twice (2009 and 2010), both times as a #15 seed. Their home gym is Tamladge Hill Field House, named in honor of a former coach and constructed in 1974.
Prestige Ranking: 1.5 out of 5
Location
Sitting about four miles from downtown, Morgan State is located between the Lauraville and Hillen neighborhoods. The college was placed here in spite of local protests during the early 1900s. The surroundings are mainly housing tracts as the immediate area offers little beyond coming here for a sporting event. Northwoods Commons, a few minutes away, is your best bet for food in the form of quick-service places. If you have a little time before the game, take a moment to walk campus as the divide between old historic buildings and stunning newer architecture is impressive. To reach Baltimore and the attractions of the Inner Harbor, it’ll take about 15 minutes by car.
Location Ranking: 5 out of 10
Accessibility / Parking
Interstates from all directions come into Baltimore and Morgan State sits between I-83 and I-95. There is a good distance between the two highways and relatively lengthy local road travel is needed to get to campus. It’s a straight shot though as from I-83, you just take Cold Spring Lane the whole way. From I-95, Moravia Road is what will get you to Morgan State. A road on the perimeter leads to the sports facilities and it is simple to reach the Student Center Garage. Gameday parking here is just a very short distance to Hill Field House. I ran into a little hiccup as the garage was closed when I got here at 10:45 AM for a Noon game. There were some spaces on the nearby side road and I parked there until the PA in the gym asked fans to move their car to the garage just prior to the start of the game. Traffic getting out was non-existent and area weekend congestion isn’t as impactful as the weekdays.
Accessibility / Parking Ranking: 7 out of 8
Exterior
The square arena is tall and most of the exterior is made up of a speckled brown material divided between vertical concrete columns. Towards the top are gray vertical liners. There are several additions and attachments that are designed with tan-colored brick and that is most noticeable near the main entrance. With a glass enclosing behind it, this is a decent entrance and “Talmadge L. Hill Field House” is spelled out in black lettering.
Exterior Ranking: 4.5 out of 10
Concourse
Each entrance leads right into a hallway that is an interesting mix of old and new. You have concrete flooring designed to look like bricks and there are lockers on the side wall. Yet the new is a catchy “The Morgan Way” sign and streetlamp like lighting on the side. It’s a unique vibe. There’s plenty of room inside the gymnasium, especially behind the baskets and there is also a “concourse” on one of the sides. As you enter through a corner (watch out for the players walking to the locker room), a somewhat narrow hallway opens up at the center, where you can find the lone concession stand. This is also where you need to go if you want to enter the upper seating sections. While plenty of nice team displays make it look good, there are also remaining features that date the building. This includes payphones and a wall analog clock.
Concourse Ranking: 2 out of 5
Food
Bare-bones offerings left me disappointed as I was hoping for something that would act as a lunch. Instead, I had to settle for a greasy pretzel. The Hot Dog was sad, while Nachos had a bit more depth to it. Otherwise, there are chips, candy and vending machines.
Food Ranking: 1.5 out of 8
Interior
This is moreso a multi-functional gym that happens to have seating as opposed to a basketball arena. Sideline seating features pullout bleachers that have rows of blue bucket benches. Then, a platform divides an “upper” section that you can not access from inside the arena. Each side is a little bit different as one of them features a much bigger seating area that goes up 18 rows. In fact, it gets kind of close to the low hanging ceiling (which looks decent with its white tiles). Proximity to the court isn’t fantastic, but the seating section is nice and steep. Fold-down chairs are old and they are light blue and orange. It’s weird because the shading of those colors is different than what is seen on the other side, where the newer chairs are more traditional and have a brighter color. There are eight rows here with a break in the middle for a corridor to access stairs. One end has bleachers, while the other has open space. Overall, on second thought, there’s enough variety and character to see this as more than a gym.
Interior Ranking: 6.5 out of 14
Scoreboard
A simple square scoreboard sits just under the ceiling at center court as it features the usual basketball information. It has a clean look with a blue background and orange numbers, along with a wordmark at the top. A video display located at each end wall shows the game feed.
Scoreboard Ranking: 2.5 out of 4
Displays
Hill Field House is a fitting place for all sports to be honored and Morgan State begins it with a Hall of Fame in the main entrance area. At the top of a side wall are each class of inductees, along with their picture. Display cases then follow in the side hallway and they contain a nice variety of trophies, some of them quite intricate. Team pictures and even a giant bear statue add more character to the area. Inside the gym, there are no achievement banners, but rather huge pictures of former Morgan State athletes that have had their number retired.
Displays Ranking: 4 out of 6
Cost
Visitor parking is $3, but there is a chance that is free on gamedays, as was the case for the game I went to. Tickets are $15, going up to $20 for games against local conference rivals. This is typical for MEAC teams. Snacks at the concession stand were $3 – $5.
Cost Ranking: 7.5 out of 8
Fan Support
Being a Sunday in November against a no-name opponent, I wasn’t expecting much of a crowd and that was indeed the case with maybe 100 folks there at the start of the game. However, this was a doubleheader as the Women were playing at 2 PM against Sacred Heart and as the Men’s game was wrapping up, the crowd was at least 4 times the original size. Conference play is better for crowd numbers and Morgan State ranks in the middle of the MEAC in terms of attendance. A weekend game in the heart of the season will generally fill about half the gym.
Fan Support Ranking: 2 out of 8
Atmosphere
Most of the game just featured some clapping after each basket and even though it was a small crowd, I thought they could’ve been more vocal. It was a tie game late in the second half and the Bears responded with a big run that produced little in the way of reaction from fans. The only thing that brought some noise was a dunk and a nice play. There was no pep band, but there was a DJ.
Atmosphere Ranking: 3.5 out of 14
Other Stuff
This part of Maryland is great as there are so many options, especially if you are a college basketball junkie. Within a 20 minute drive is Morgan State, Coppin State, Loyola and Towson. On this Sunday, I saw two of the four……When I arrived, I was surprised to see Kevin Broadus on the sidelines as Head Coach. Remember back to 2009 when he was one of the contributors to chaos in Binghamton, leaving that program in disarray.
Game
Low-Major programs have a hard time getting other D1 schools to visit during the non-conference part of the schedule. Credit Morgan State for playing UMBC, Longwood and James Madison(!) at home this season. That still means a few games against non-D1 schools unless they want to spend the majority of the time on the road. The Bears played down to their opponents on this day as it felt like they thought a 36-29 halftime lead was enough. As they slept through the second half, it wasn’t until Wilkes-Barre tied it at 50 with 7:30 to play did the Bears wake up. They went on a 14-0 run to put the game away. Kamron Hobbs led Morgan State with 21 points.
Stadium and Arena Visits 
