Value City Arena
architectural structure
Value City Arena is a multi-purpose arena, located on the campus of Ohio State University, in Columbus, Ohio, United States. The arena opened in 1998 and is currently the largest by seating capacity in the Big Ten Conference, with 19,049 seats, which is reduced to 18,809 for Ohio State men's and women’s basketball games.
It is home to Ohio State Buckeyes men's basketball, women's basketball and men's ice hockey teams. Previously, the basketball teams played at St. John Arena, while the ice hockey team played at the OSU Ice Arena. The facility is named the Jerome Schottenstein Center in honor of Jerome Schottenstein, of Columbus, late founder of Schottenstein Stores Corp. and lead benefactor of the project, while the seating bowl is named for Schottenstein's store Value City Furniture, naming rights which transferred to that entity after the original Value City department store chain went out of business in 2008.
The Schottensteins and Ohio State are currently in the process of finding a new naming rights partner for the arena, with Value City Furniture's own bankruptcy and wind down of operations which started in earnest at the start of January 2026.
Relationship to Nationwide Arena
Prior to July 1, 2010, one of Value City Arena's major event competitors was the downtown Nationwide Arena, which opened in 2000 and is home to the NHL's Columbus Blue Jackets. In May 2010, the Blue Jackets and OSU signed a one-year, annually renewable, agreement to turn over day-to-day operations and non-athletic event booking of Nationwide Arena to OSU, effective July 1, 2010.
This brief starts where responsible research should: with the source description of “Value City Arena” as architectural structure. Everything that follows is an evidence route, not borrowed authority.
Why this record matters
The subject matters to the general reference register because the source frames it as architectural structure. Its deeper value depends on whether names, dates, institutions and citations support that framing.
The citation trail is more important than the brevity of the summary: it shows where individual claims can be examined in context. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 9, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q783033. Authority coordinates are 40.008, -83.025. 2 of 2 selected statements include explicit references; 1 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1998, 2008, 2026 and 2010.
A concise general-reference account can conceal disagreements about scope, terminology or the weight assigned to individual sources. The source lead contains qualifying language; that uncertainty should survive quotation, summary and reuse. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
How to read it
Use the entry as an orientation point, then follow its citations and revision history. Names, dates and institutional relationships should be checked against the original record.
- Subject orientation
- Search vocabulary
- Locating named sources
The closest primary source, responsible institution and strongest cited specialist reference.
Three-step research path
- Establish the record: confirm the title “Value City Arena”, its source revision and the description used here.
- Expand the search: follow Value City Arena primary sources, Value City Arena archive and Value research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
- Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.
Questions for further research
- Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Value City Arena”?
- Which institution is responsible for the underlying evidence?
- Which cited source is closest to the event, object or claim?
Search terms from this dossier
This entry incorporates text from “Value City Arena” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.