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An overhead view of Pauley Pavilion at the Bruins’ season-opener against San Diego. Though rich in tradition (and National Championship banners), Pauley does not intimidate opponents as much as other Pac-10 arenas like Oregon’s McArthur Court.

Just how insane does it get inside of Oregon’s McArthur Court, aka The Pit, aka the house of horrors for visiting teams?

Two years ago in a game against Top-10 Arizona, officials told head coach Ernie Kent that he needed to quiet the crowd while Arizona shot free throws or else face a technical foul.

Kent had no other solution but to get on the public address microphone and explain, “You need to quiet down.”

And even after Kent’s warning, a court-level camera later showed the rim literally swaying left and right as a hopeless Wildcat tried to shoot from the charity stripe.

Playing at Mac Court? It’s the pits.

Last year, the Sporting News named Oregon’s 9,087-seat, 76-year old arena “best gym in America,” and for good reason. The Ducks went a perfect 16-0 at home during the 2001-2002 season, thanks in large part to a raucous crowd that is just feet from the action.

“They have rambunctious fans,” senior forward Jason Kapono said. “There’s not much to celebrate in terms of nightlife in the area, so they glorify all their sports teams.”

One of UCLA’s two losses in the 1994-1995 championship season was at The Pit, and Arizona also lost in Eugene two years later during its own title year.

When Oregon changed Mac Court’s lower-level seats from bleachers to bucket seats, then-Ducks coach Jerry Green got an idea of the arena’s fan connection.

“A lady came to my office with handcuffs on,” Green says in the team media guide. “She said, ‘I’ve had the same seat for 35 years. You can’t do this to me.’”

Sure enough, the woman sat cuffed to her seat during the next Duck home game.

The Pit was the one place that every current UCLA player or coach brought up when asked about the toughest places to play in the Pac-10.

The sea of red at Arizona’s McKale Center was also a popular choice. Though the Wildcats didn’t have a specific student allotment for tickets until this season, the 14,545 seats, mostly filled with alumni and other boosters, still make for a cacophonous headache.

“Every time they score, they have this stupid Wildcat sound,” senior guard Ray Young said.

UCLA hasn’t won at McKale since Steve Lavin’s first season at head coach.

“Great coach; great fans; great players,” Lavin said.

The Bay Area schools have also made their mark with unique, rim-shaking venues. Stanford’s tiny Maples Pavilion seats just 7,391, but the intimate atmosphere and springs underneath the floor make it as uncomfortable as arenas twice its size.

But Maples’ most fearsome feature is the Sixth Man, a student section as crass as it is loud.

Former Bruin Matt Barnes felt the Sixth Man’s wrath last season. Two days after being ejected from a game at Cal for elbowing diminutive Bear point guard Shantay Legans, the Cardinal fans had a gift for Barnes.

Mug shots. By the hundreds, in the hands of bloodthirsty Stanford students.

Barnes’ crime: “assaulting a midget.”

On another occasion, the Cardinal faithful brought in a gigantic marijuana cigarette to mock UCLA’s Jelani McCoy, who was serving a suspension at the time.

Across the Bay, Cal’s Haas Pavilion is quickly making a name for itself with vertical seating and an environment that has done its best to retain the old-school feel of Harmon Gym, the Bears’ old home.

But still, there’s just something about Oregon.

Something not so classy.

“Oregon is a little more ... what’s the word ... annoying,” Young said.

“They are borderline rude, disrespectful,” Kapono said. “I don’t mind them taunting me, but when they get into my personal life and my family, they’re crossing a line.”

It’s a line that some would like to see better toed at Pauley Pavilion. Attendance has been down over the years and students routinely complain about what they perceive to be ignorance by the athletic department of their concerns.

Instead of placing students along an entire side of the court, as is the case at places like Stanford and Oregon, UCLA seats its students from the floor up to the rafters in a much narrower swath of seats.

“They definitely need to make some changes to make this a more imposing place to play,” Kapono said. “There’s something about Pauley – with the banners and everything – that makes every team come in here focused.”

When compared to Haas, an arena with similar capacity, Pauley is cavernous and has more “dead” space behind the baskets.

Part of it is because Pauley was built as an all-purpose gym (volleyball plays there, too) and thus needs more floor space. Recent talk about renovating the 37-year old arena has included efforts to pare the atmosphere down and make it more intimate.

“The first thing they need to do is bring the seats closer to the floor and get rid of the dead area,” Young said. “Bottom line, they need to make student seating the top priority.

“You come in here sometimes and it’s like a neutral court.”

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