bet365 Travel Diaries: Cowboy Stadium and watching the Mavericks vs. Timbervolves

After a big Edmonton win in Game 1 on Thursday night, we spent our day off in Dallas grinding through a couple of work items before heading to AT&T Stadium for a guided tour and then soaking up the scene for Game 2 between the Dallas Mavericks and Minnesota Timberwolves.

When the boys locked in an OT win, we went out for a quick celebratory drink before returning to the hotel to get some sleep and recharge. All four of us were exhausted, and a good night’s sleep was exactly what the doctor ordered because Friday morning was a busy one for the four of us. Despite being on the road, we still had plenty of work to do, and none of the items on our to-do list were likely to get done if we didn’t recover from a lot of travel on day one.

Once we eventually woke up, all four of us got to work on what needed to get done so that we could head out and enjoy the day in Dallas. Since three of us had never been to Dallas before, the options for what to do were seemingly endless, so we decided to turn Friday into a big sports day. With sports on the top of our minds and knowing how football is religion in Texas, we thought a tour of Cowboys Stadium (AT&T Stadium) would be the perfect way to spend a couple of hours.

Admittedly, I’m not a huge NFL guy, so I was trying to figure out what to expect from a stadium tour for a team I don’t care about, but once we arrived, it was pretty obvious why this was a thing people do. To be blunt, that place is as ridiculous as it is massive. From the moment we walked in the door, it was apparent that Jerry Jones spared no expense when putting the place together. It was like no detail was too small to care about, and how much the fan experience seemed to matter in the design was very impressive.

It took us a couple of hours to wander through AT&T Stadium and check the whole thing out, and even though I don’t care about football, I fully admit how impressive it was to go into the Cowboys’ dressing room, hear about the upcoming World Cup plans, and see how much attention to detail went into putting that massive building together.

My favourite story was when we were told that Jerry Jones paid to close down a Walmart across a big parking lot from the stadium when they hosted the Super Bowl back in 2011. Long story short, there’s this big Walmart right beside the stadium, and the event organizers didn’t want to deal with any additional security risks they were already going to have on their plate. Hence, Jones reached out to Walmart, asked for their best weekend sales number, and offered to triple it. The store closed down immediately.

Once the tour wrapped, we were looking for something to eat and noticed the Dallas Mavericks and Minnesota Timberwolves game was about to start. Unfortunately, the game was in Minnesota, so we couldn’t try to find last-minute tickets. Instead, we decided to head to a bar downtown to watch the game and put a few bets down, and the experience was fantastic.

Not only did the Mavericks come back to win after being down by 12 points at the half, but the bar we were in was going bananas the entire time. Even though I don’t care about basketball all that much, it was impossible not to get excited about the Mavs comeback and watching Luka Doncic wrap up the win with what was basically a buzzer beater. To put it lightly, the vibes were electric.

Now, with a day of Dallas sports and scenery under our belts, we’re off to watch some horse racing before it’s time to get ready for what will surely be an exciting Game 2 at the American Airlines Arena. Even though the boys did their job by coming to Dallas and picking up a win, it would be incredible if they could also find a way to grab this second matchup. All I know for sure is that I’m pretty damned excited to get jersey’d up and get going.