Every Super Bowl Sunday, hundreds of gamblers head to the Grand Sierra Resort and Casino, the biggest of its variety in northern Nevada, to wager on the large sport and celebration with fellow soccer followers. High rollers dine on all-you-can-eat buffets and the champagne flows in V.I.P. rooms all through the large advanced. Long traces snake out of the William Hill Sportsbook simply off the on line casino ground.
But the motion this 12 months was supercharged as a result of the Super Bowl included the San Francisco 49ers, and lots of the crew’s followers in California, the place sports activities betting remains to be unlawful, crossed the border into Nevada to lay down bets and have fun with their brethren.
Some of the followers thought-about touring to Las Vegas, the place the Super Bowl was performed for the primary time this 12 months. But they didn’t need to battle the crowds solely to pay daunting costs for lodges and meals. Reno might lack the thrill of Las Vegas, they stated, however the self-proclaimed Biggest Little City within the World had the advantage of being inexpensive and handy, roughly a four-hour drive from the Bay Area.
“I could have gone to Vegas, but everything’s hiked up there,” stated Daniel Burnett, a 49ers fan from San Francisco who stayed the weekend on the Grand Sierra. “Here, everything’s in one place.”
Everything, it appears, however a 49ers win. They fell to the Kansas City Chiefs in time beyond regulation, 25-22, leaving many San Francisco followers on the on line casino shocked, and some in tears.
Still, it was like Nevada’s Super Bowl overflow celebration with a decidedly extra low-key vibe. The on line casino lodges in Reno wouldn’t have the fountains that grace the Bellagio on the Vegas Strip. Few folks come right here for midnight helicopter rides. What occurs in Reno doesn’t at all times keep in Reno. But for regulars like Jacob and Nicole Wood, two Raiders followers who drove 4 hours from Clearlake, Calif., Reno is simply effective.
“No way I’m paying $11,000 for a ticket in Las Vegas,” Mr. Wood stated. He and his spouse, who additionally bets on horseracing and basketball, have watched the Super Bowl in Reno for a dozen years.
In some ways, the Super Bowl highlighted anew the hole between Las Vegas and Reno. Las Vegas is a world leisure capital referred to as the setting for motion pictures just like the “Ocean’s” and “Hangover” franchises. After years of being shunned by skilled sports activities leagues, the town is now residence to the Stanley Cup champion Golden Knights and the Raiders of the N.F.L.
Reno? Many casinos have shut or merged. Downtown is pockmarked by open heaps. Sports? There’s a Triple A baseball franchise, the Aces, and the National Bowling Stadium.
And whereas Las Vegas continues to market extravagance and extra, Reno, which is lower than one-quarter of the dimensions, appears perpetually at a crossroads. The cities stay rivals, particularly after they battle for funding within the state capital, Carson City, half-hour south of Reno. But when folks consider Nevada, Las Vegas sometimes springs to thoughts.
“The North-South divide in Nevada is very ingrained and entrenched,” stated John L. Smith, a longtime journalist from Las Vegas who now lives in Reno. “The South was jealous of the North’s power. The North was jealous of the South’s pizazz and money and growth.”
It could also be exhausting to ponder, however for a few years Reno was Las Vegas earlier than Las Vegas turned Sin City. Founded within the 1860s as a railway hub, the town prospered through the silver and gold rushes. Reno turned the divorce capital of America as a result of {couples} have been required to stay right here for under six months — lowered in later years to six weeks — earlier than benefiting from the state’s liberal guidelines for splitting up.
As divorces flooded in, so did attorneys and bankers. Hotels, casinos and different leisure institutions sprang up. After playing was legalized statewide in 1931, new guests arrived. Movies that flicked on the metropolis’s divorce business have been filmed in Reno, together with “The Misfits,” starring Marilyn Monroe and Clark Gable.
But Reno has been a metropolis of transients, and as different states adopted “no fault” divorce legal guidelines, one of many metropolis’s calling playing cards light. By the 1950 census, Las Vegas had surpassed Reno as casinos went up on the Strip, drawing Hollywood entertainers and greater crowds in southern Nevada.
Reno, named for a Civil War basic who by no means stepped foot in Nevada, continues to seek for a brand new identification. Starting within the Eighties, it was hit by a wave of on line casino closures and bankruptcies. The stream of gamblers coming right here slowed after Native American casinos opened in California.
Motels and casinos have been knocked down to make manner for redevelopment that has barely begun. Last 12 months, an overhaul of the previous Harrah’s Reno lodge and on line casino stalled, leaving an enormous eyesore. Many of the remaining casinos are windowless, self-contained bubbles which have turned the encompassing streets into uninviting walkways.
“Downtown is at war with itself, battling the needs of the casinos for parking and open space geared toward tourists versus residential mixed-use density,” stated Alicia Barber, a neighborhood historian and creator of “Reno’s Big Gamble: Image and Reputation in the Biggest Little City.” “We’re trying to establish a sense of place.”
Things received so dangerous that analysts learning the town in 2010 puzzled whether or not Reno may flip into the Detroit of the West by 2020. In December, Allegiant Airlines — whose identify is on the stadium the place the Super Bowl was performed — stated it could not fly in or out of Reno, leaving simply two airways providing nonstop flights between the town and Las Vegas.
In the previous decade or so, Reno has pivoted. Apple, Tesla, Panasonic and different firms have opened services within the space, attracting Californians in quest of tech jobs and cheaper properties. The metropolis has marketed its easy accessibility to world-class snowboarding and different outside pursuits close to Lake Tahoe.
Reno nonetheless has loads of casinos to draw gamblers from California, Idaho, Utah and different neighboring states the place sports activities betting has not been legalized. None has performed extra to entice these guests than the Grand Sierra, which has a movie show, a bowling alley, night time golf equipment, a 3,000-seat theater and a Charlie Palmer steakhouse.
Chris Abraham, the senior vp of selling at Grand Sierra, stated the resort places on Super Bowl events yearly, however guests have been up 10 p.c this 12 months as a result of the 49ers have been within the massive sport. About 1,600 company packed a ballroom and dined on Kansas City barbecue, wings and nachos. Smaller teams paid up to $2,000 for a desk within the Lex Nightclub.
“A lot of people looked at Las Vegas and said it was going to be ridiculous there, I can get the same kind of experience here,” Mr. Abraham stated.
As sports activities playing has unfold, the Grand Sierra and Reno have been providing folks extra causes to go to. In 2022, the sports activities e book was refurbished and a Chickie’s & Pete’s sports activities bar opened. The resort will make investments about $1 billion into the 140-acre property over the following decade, together with constructing a ten,000-seat area.
But even with all that but to come, Reno was nonetheless an oasis in contrast with Las Vegas for some followers this 12 months.
“It feels good but extra good because the 49ers are in it,” Deron Dow, who drove from San Francisco along with his buddy Martha Anaya, stated earlier than the sport.
And it beat paying the costs and combating the crowds in Las Vegas.
“Vegas would have been way worse,” Mr. Dow stated.
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