Ted Constant Convocation Center

I am an alumni of the great institution of Old Dominion University and i am very disappointed with the seating at the Ted. The seats are made for 5 foot 4 inch 145 lb teens.
To go to a alumni event or concert is extremely uncomfortable for anyone larger than 6 ft or 260lbs. Stay away. I have not had such small seats since going to asian stadium movie seats.
My recommendation is stay away. Put your event at the scope. ODU needs to get the Ted reseated as these seats are smaller than economy class in airlines. They make jetblue seats look like massive first class seating.
It is sad that my university is so anti large or tall people. In fact these seats are out right discriminatory towards a large portion of the populace. Shame on the designers.

This is great venue to watch sports and concerts. I regularly attend ODU basketball games and just attended my first ODU wrestling match. It’s always a good time!
There is a decent selection of things to eat from hot dogs, pop corn, funnel cakes chicken tenders. It is classic stadium food. All the concessions are pricey so do not expect a deal.
They have a Blue Room to drink before the games if you are a big money booster and season ticket holder for basketball.
Come check out the Ted for your next sporting event or concert.
They new club level seating is amazing too! You can drink alcohol up there and really elevate your experience.

This facility is set up pretty dang good. I travel a lot and go to quite a few stadiums and the Convocation Center’s easy flow in and out and easy access to plenty of bathrooms makes it much more enjoyable experience. Something that you don’t always get at a venue despite there being a high price to attend. This year alone I’ve been at AT&T’s Cowboys stadium in Dallas and the Spurs in San Antonio. The Verizon center for the Wizards, the Redskins crappy stadium and the Albuquerque PIT. The foot traffic flow throughout this place rivals the big money Cowboys stadium and beats the PIT hands down. All that said parking could be much better but it’s still not bad so overall I give it 4 Stars and remain a big fan.
PS: Get better food vendors and you’ll easily push it up to 5 Stars.

Love the TED. It’s bright, big, the seats are comfy, and there is literally no bad place to sit. The seats are angled perfectly to ensure everyone can see the court. Love having events here! Go ODU!

I’ve been there many times for many different events.
Sports, graduations, etc.
My main complaint is how UN-​FRIENDLY it is to the handicapped. Or those who just prefer not to walk a bunch of stairs.
You follow the signs up several flights of stairs, only to find your seats are down several sections and you are walking down several flights, only to have to walk back up several flights to get to the bathrooms and food.
Poor design.
The concession food is slighty better than other places, thankfully there is no parking fee, mostly it is fairly easy to get in and get out of.

I have been wanting a reason to come the Ted Constant Convocation Center for a long time. Nothing had presented itself to me for almost 10 years. My wife who works at ODU is there often for meetings. However, it was a ODU Men’s Basketball game that got me in the door.
Affectionately known to those in the community as «The Ted» this was part of a 2000 University Village project to bring in restaurants, college housing and more. Construction was completed in the Fall of 2002. Parking for The Ted is in a parking garage beside and it’s FREE!
When you have never been in some place, seen pics, or really have anyone tell you about it there is no expectation. So I must say I am now a huge fan after seeing what they pulled off for a small 10,000 seat venue. As a matter of fact The Ted has been voted in the top 10 of all venues under 10K in the world and 2^nd in the U.S. They are managed by Global Spectrum and from what I could see operations are excellent.
The front of the building is modern and attractive. The outside sidewalk areas clear with trash cans around. The trees out front were all lit up with white lights for the Holidays and looked festive.
My experience with ticket check in was terrific and friendly. The lobby surprised me, lot of ODU memorabilia that was organized neatly in cases. A very small under whelming cart sold ODU items for the game. If there is one improvement I could make it’s to gave a retail store to sell ODU items.
Once inside I was completely impressed with the aesthetics as a basketball venue. Awesome scoreboard and newer floor from what I understand. Sixteen luxury suites surround the interior up rights. There are also upper club and priority cushioned seats in the venue. The bulk of seating for basketball are 7,300+ comfortable fold downs.
My seats were general admission which is beside and behind the ODU band. If you get there early enough like I did these are really great seats and you can almost set on the floor. It was also nice to be beside the ODU Pep Band which kept the energy up throughout the game. I was quite shocked to find the seating was probably 75% full and this is break folks.
There are two concession stations on the second level that serve exactly the same thing. Service was friendly, the fries were HOT and seasoned nicely and prices fair. NO Alcohol is served.
The product as far as ODU Basketball is excellent. Tickets are cheap and season tickets are offered and I found that many get them too! They are having a great season and are 11 – 1 at this point in the season leading up to continued conference play in January. The team dominated and ultimately ran over St. Mary’s. This team should be a NCAA contender. How far they will go if there tix is punched is anyone’s guess.
Before leaving I walked around the facility some and did utilized the restrooms. For a 12 year old building it appears brand new, there is no signs of wear and the management of the facility has been excellent. Departure out of the garage was insane easy, you just don’t find that when you go to an event.
I enjoyed myself so much that I got tickets for tomorrow’s Women’s home game. I can’t wait to do it all over again at The Ted. Don’t let the current overall rating fool you, this is a 4 – 5 star venue easy and we are lucky to have it in Norfolk my friends.

My high school graduation was here, my cousin who I tutored in math’s high school graduation was here, and I recently attended my ODU college graduation here (Saturday December 13^th, 2015 at 9:00AM); furthermore, I’ve attended many concerts and sporting events throught the years here, so you can say that this place has been a big part of my life.
The design of this venue is nice, it’s very spacious, and has different areas, and sections to hold multiple events if need be. The bathrooms are surprisingly clean to have such a big public occupancy which is a plus for me. If I had to nitpick I would say that the seats could be a little more comfortable, and there could be a little more space between the isles. Other than that this venue is beautiful both inside and out, and will always hold a lot of cherisable memories. I definitely recommend partaking in an event here at least once in your life.

I came here for the Winter Meltdown concert and I must say overall the place is decent. I had an okay time at the concert. However, the security here is beyond awful! They had stated they were opening the doors at 5 pm it was about 545 and we were still outside waiting. Mind you it was pouringgggg outside, thank god I wasn’t out in the actual rain but you would think with the horrible weather conditions they would at least try and stick to the time they stated they would open the doors. Also, while the concert was happening so much was going on with people crowd surfing and throwing themselves. Security just was not doing their job, that night was horrible!

I’m a fan. I graduated from ODU with an M.A. in 2010 and while going to school there only attended one state women’s basketball championship game when my undergraduate school, JMU, was playing ODU. Bad I know, but I bleed purple.
The inside when you first enter is beautiful. I love the architechtural choices they made. It has huge expansive windows which let in a lot of natural light from the outside. There are many sports memorabilia trophies decorating the front hall and the floor has an ODU mosaic pattern if I remember correctly.
The sports trophy area also tells a story and provides some history about ODU’s sports teams and their accomplishments. I think it is very well and tastefully done and it is very striking when you first enter this building.
The bathrooms and concessions are upstairs so you’ll be walking up at least one-​two flights of stairs when you enter probably. They have two or three concession areas on each level where you can buy the typical snacks: nachos, soda, hot dogs, bottled water, etc.
I also saw Cirque du Soliel here last year and I had a fairly pleasant experience. We weren’t in the front row but we were «floor» and sat about 3 – 4 rows back. It was super close to the stage and if we had been any closer up it may have been difficult to see the performers.
I realize this is a traveling show and they do the best they can with the various venues but I’m sure ODU’s staff at this building are aware that when folks pay for a show they intend to be able to see it, unobstructed. So that was somewhat annoying but it wasn’t really directly affecting me, almost, but not quite.
The parking at ODU is always a nightmare situation. They have added several garages to accomodate parking for events at this location. With I think three very close by. If you attend something on a school night expect delays because students are commuting in and out of classes, they are being told they can’t park in spots they’ve paid $ 250+ for passes to park in and are angry, and traffic backs up on Hampton Blvd. Fortunately I’ve never experienced it, but I saw it when I was a student and it didn’t look fun. I’ll stick to weekends, it’s bad enough on weekends. The parking garages have one entrance and exit mostly and while they are new and fairly well designed, when thousands of people are trying to leave at the same time it creates a major delay inside the garages so be prepared to sit for a while both coming and going.
All in all — I think this is a fabulous addition to ODU’s campus and it was very well designed. I enjoy attending shows here and this is one of the rare buildings on campus that make me proud of ODU as my alma mater.

The Ted Constant Convocation Center is where Old Dominion University basketball teams play their home games. I recently went to the arena to see my little brother college basketball game. There’s parking available in a deck next to the arena. Arrive early to avoid the heavy traffic. Visiting players will call is located inside of the main entrance at a table (must show ID). I sat behind the bench but all seats have a good view of the main court. The arena staff was very polite and welcoming, even though we had on the opposing team jerseys. I appreciated the great hospitality from staff at Ted Constant Convocation Center. The arena was well maintained and clean. I like how memorabilia is placed throughout the arena including the Women’s National Championship trophies. I give Ted Constant Convocation Center a 4 star rating rounded up to a 4.5 because of hospitality.

Parking can be a pain, get there early. Go with the garage if you can b/​c the surrounding area can get sketchy late night.

I’ve attended several graduations here in the past and while the place is nice I didn’t really think much about it. However, after attending my first concert here I find I like the place quite a bit more than I did.
The design of the entire place is really for basketball games with a ringed concourse all the way around the top of the seating. There’s plenty of food and beverages if you want. Beer’s are pricey at $ 10 a pop, but I think that’s pretty much the norm at any arena or amphitheater these days.
The Ted works really well for concerts and other events where you don’t need a full sized 20,000 capacity arena to. I caught the band Sigur Ros here last Tuesday night the 24^th of Sept and really enjoyed the show. The Ted was a perfect environment for a band of this type, and unlike the Scope no horrible vibrations during the performance.
One last thing, it’s insanely easy to get in and out of either of the parking garages located on either side of the arena as because your parking fee is covered in the ticket cost. So no additional stopping to pay someone. I would definitely catch a show here again.

As always the Ted Constant Center is a beautiful place. If you are going to hear music, I personally would say it is the best venue in the Tidewater Area. The Acoustics are wonderful!

First Time at this venue, The parking was a snap, as long as you back in, don’t be a stupid face and pull in and make everyone wait for you to back out your pinto… The seating in section 115 was pretty good!, Im glad i did not get floor seats, made this mistake at a smack-​down show a few weeks back at the scope so i knew floor seating just is not for events most events really worth while. The Building itself had this sort of… creepy, high-​school gymnasium type vibe to it. When i was in the Bathroom I was always looking over my shoulder expecting to get Hazed. Overall id come back here for an event, I will see the seating is kind of cramped and even sitting down you have to get up to let people pass, cant just do the theater thing and rub all up on people and get by in this establishment. It was however amusing to watch people coming to the row in-​front of us that had 2 rather large women in it and seeing the look on peoples faces like «FML» before they asked them to get up.

We saw Cirque du Soleil here and will certainly choose better the next time we see anything here. Fortunately, we were advised to back into a parking space in order to get out after the performance, that was very good advice. It was much easier to enter the stream of headlights heading for the exit. It seems there is only one exit from the main parking structure. I’m sure the cars behind us were not too happy since we let 3 cars into the line ahead of us.
Our seats were on the floor but we had to go up a large flight of stairs and then down a large flight of cement stairs. It is clear that there in an entrance to the ground floor from street level but the guards with blue shirts and crossed arms prevented us from using this. I am certainly glad I left my heels at home because after the show we did it in reverse.
Fortunately we didn’t need to use the restrooms or concessions at intermission, they are on the upper floor. Sure the exercise is always good but we didn’t dress for it.
Not knowing any better and very excited to see Cirque for our first time we got front row floor seats, Huge Mistake. We couldn’t see the floor of the stage, it was above us. There were lots of empty seats, on this Saturday night performance, why would you put floor seating below the stage??? I feel bad for the people behind us on the floor. My husband is 6’2″. The stadium seating would have been much better. The floor seating should have had nose bleed pricing. Additionally, these were metal folding chairs connected to each other, not comfortable at all.
Now that I have seen the inside of this venue I will choose better the next time.

I’m a little biased about this place. Why? It holds close to me with ODU. A graduate of 2005 I believe I was the first class to have a graudation ceremony at the Ted Constant Convocation Center. I did fall asleep during graduation though…
It’s not the biggest venue in the area. But that being said there is not a single bad seat in the house. This place has been host to several events: graduations, ODU basketball, WWE/​TNA wrestling, concerts, job fairs, fundraisers and the list goes on…
It’s clean, well lit and great for the many events I listed above. I certainly suggest checking the joint out if you can… My recommendation — ODU baskeball. Get some tickets to the blue room and your in a special extremely large room sippin’ on some beer before, during and after the game.
Oh, and another soft spot with this place… I got to meet Ric Flair here in 2009. WOOOOOOOOOO!

Funny that the only other review was for an ODU Graduation ceremony. Well I came here for the 2011 ODU Graduation Ceremony!
Like he said, this is a small arena, even by college standards. The concourse areas are small and I would imagine during a sporting event it would be difficult to walk around. It was somewhat too crowded to walk around and that wasn’t even with the arena filled to capacity.
The seats are comfortable but if you’re tall you may feel like your knees are in the back of the head of the person in front of you…

I was here to witness the 2010 ODU Graduation Ceremony. My sister was one of the hundreds of graduates in attendance, and it was a proud moment for our family. She is the last to graduate of my parent’s children. Both my parents were proud, relieved, and humbled that their journey from the Philippines to the US over 30 years ago had finally come to fruition.
The Convocation Center is not a large venue by any means. Its maximum seating capacity is roughly 10,000 seats. What this translates to is that there really isn’t a bad seat in the entire building.
There are more than enough restrooms and handicapped seating, as well as luxury boxes and concession stands. I thought that the venue was designed for function as opposed to elegance. But Norfolk is a blue collar/​military town, so one wouldn’t expect anything otherwise.
There are several parking decks, with two being adjacent to the center. Street parking is also an option as well.
Cheers to you…