Don't expect to see a modern scoreboard at the Patriot Center any time soon

For years Mason fans have moaned over the 1980s-looking scoreboard currently in the Patriot Center that to this day still lacks a video screen. After the Final Four run in 2006 most thought it was a lock it would be updated. Most of the campus was under construction and money was being thrown around for new projects left and right; meanwhile let's forget how many other CAA schools have better scoreboards with smaller budgets. We had once learned that the old scoreboard from the Verizon Center, which is owned by the same group that owns the Patriot Center was going to be donated but the current ceiling conditions in Fairfax could not support it.

We learned yesterday that those problems with the ceiling are apparently still an issue:

Plans to install a new scoreboard at the Patriot Center have now been scaled back. Originally, Mason set out to get a scoreboard nearly twice the size of the current one (which weighs in at roughly 4,500 lbs). A more modern scoreboard that would feature LCD screens with far superior graphics is long overdue.

But now, it looks like the cost of reinforcing the roof enough to handle that kind of weight is just too much for the state school to bear this year. Mason Intercollegiate Athletics is revising its request for proposals, asking for a new scoreboard that is of equal or lesser weight than the current scoreboard. More details to come, but it’s not likely there will be much movement on this before the fall.

I get that this isn't a priority but one of the reasons Larranaga left the school was because of the administrators unwillingness to upgrade certain facilities. I don't know if you'd put this under the same category as something like a practice facility but it's getting kinda of embarrassing having to look up at an outdated scoreboard often with burned out lights.  

(via @Masonbuilding, @TheMasonBench)