Pan American Center is a multi-purpose arena in Las Cruces, New Mexico, located on the campus of New Mexico State University. The arena has a current seating capacity of 12,515 people.

Venue: Pan American Center
Town: Las Cruces, US
Capacity: 12,482

Pan American Center is a multi-purpose arena in Las Cruces, New Mexico, located on the campus of New Mexico State University. The arena has a current seating capacity of 12,515 people. The arena serves as home of the New Mexico State Aggies men's and women's basketball and women's volleyball teams. The arena hosted games of the NCAA men's basketball tournament in 1969 and 1972, as well as the 2007 and 2008 Western Athletic Conference men's and women's basketball tournaments and 2007, 2016, and 2021 WAC volleyball tournaments. New Mexico A&M's first gymnasium was housed on the upper floor of what came to be known as the Armory, built in 1911 as one of several early campus buildings designed by Trost & Trost. That building still stands today and is now part of the Music Center, housing faculty offices and practice rooms. In 1938 Williams Gymnasium was constructed north of Quesenberry Field, then home of the Aggie football team, and would serve as Aggie basketball's home for the next thirty years. Williams Gym would later be renamed Williams Hall and renovated to house the art department in 1972. The structure would ultimately be demolished January 2020 after the art department had moved into the newly built Devasthali Hall the previous year. By the late 1950s, the need for a new and larger on-campus arena at what was then New Mexico A&M had become evident. Williams Gymnasium had become too small as the school and its athletic programs grew. After Las Cruces High School opened a new campus less than one mile from A&M's campus in 1957, the Aggies began to play many of their home games in the high school's new 3,000-seat gymnasium, including an NCAA Tournament game against Idaho State in 1959. When alumnus Lou Henson returned to the school-which by then had been renamed New Mexico State-as head coach in 1966 and quickly began building the basketball program into a perennial NCAA tournament participant, the push for a new facility began in earnest. In 1967, the New Mexico