Yes, G. Rollie White Coliseum is now the home to volleyball, and the coziness fits that sport well. But The Court at Reed Arena now houses Aggie basketball, and the curtain goes up on a new era Nov. 13, when Texas A&M plays North Texas in the first-ever real college basketball game in the sparkling new facility.

A&M officials are planning various promotions for the game, including the handing out of a commemorative ticket to each patron that goes through the doors.

But if you're an Aggie fan in Bryan-College Station or incoming for the Missouri football game, no fancy sales job should be required to get your foot through the door.

How many times does your team open a brand new facility with a brand new coach? Maybe every 50 years or so.

The tricky part about the grand opening of Reed Arena for basketball is that the building should help draw the fans for the opener. The product on the parquet floor, however, must seduce the fans for a whole season.

There's only so much marveling that can be attributed to having more rest rooms.

And because the Aggies won just seven games last year in Tony Barone's final year, the seduction may be like trying to grab a date with Heather Locklear when you're Pee Wee Herman.

Fortunately for the Aggies, they do have a head coach with the cool of Paul Newman and the pedigree of a Fonda.

Melvin Watkins was the right man for the job when the school began its lengthy search last March. He's a quiet guy who plans on making some noise, though realizing the clamor may not begin in earnest for a few years.

And he has simple requests of the A&M community for the opening ballgame with North Texas.

"There are only two things that I want," Watkins said, "and that's a packed house and a win. I'm a very easy guy to please."

Perhaps fans were hoping for a big-name team like UCLA or North Carolina to usher in the Watkins era. A&M officials were trying to convince Alabama to switch its schedule to tip off the season, but the Crimson Tide balked at having to play at Ohio State and A&M on the same weekend.

Watkins said the opening opponent --Êor any opponent --Êshould not be the main reason why fans come to Reed Arena. Just as R.C. Slocum has been saying for years, fans of the Aggies should come to the games to see their team play ball.

"North Texas is fine," Watkins said. "What I want to happen is people coming to see us. No matter who we play, you're not a good Aggie if you don't want to come see us.

"We want to introduce to the fans what Aggie basketball is all about. My thought is they'll come, like what they see and will come back."

There is precedent to such a notion. You just have to go back almost 20 years to remember when the fans would come back night after night. When Shelby Metcalf's 1979-80 teams were nationally ranked and battling Arkansas for Southwest Conference supremacy, you couldn't get near an Aggie basketball game unless you were a patient fan who liked long lines or knew the local fire marshall.

It was simple back then: A&M was winning basketball games. Surely when the Aggies begin winning some more, the fans will catch on to the fact that you can check the football recruiting hotlines after the basketball game.

And, hey, you'll have a chairback seat. You can have a drink in the Above the Rim Club. You can ride the elevator down to the practice gym.

What will be interesting to see is how the atmosphere changes for the big games.

Will Reed Arena be as intimidating as a packed G. Rollie White? Will the state-of-the-art sound system and air conditioning units keep Reed too nice to get rowdy?

How will visiting teams react to hot water in the showers?

My guess is Reed will have the feel only Aggies can create. Take a bit of Kyle Field, a bit of Olsen Field and add some new wrinkles from Reed, and the game day atmosphere should be able to stand on its own.

"We'll get it going, and we'll get all those Aggies out and into this building," Watkins said. "And it's going to be special. It's going to be real special."

So far, the interest from basketball fans has increased dramatically, if season ticket sales are any indication. In fact, 12th Man Foundation donors quadrupled their requests for tickets this summer and fall, adjusting to new basketball donation levels that are the norm at other schools.

As for what the ticket buyers will see this season, well, they will have to refer to their game program often to identify the new faces. Of the seven players featured on last year's media guide cover, only two remain -- senior forward Shanne Jones and junior guard Jerald Brown.

Spirited point guard Brian Barone will be replaced by junior college transfer Clifton Cook, and the six other newcomers on the team hail from such places as Alabama-Huntsville (forward Jason Boecker), Trumbull, Conn. (center Larry Jackson), Moberly Community College (forward Paul Jacobs), and Maine Central Institute (guard Shelton Wise).

Where are the homegrown boys needed to build a program? Well, Watkins will welcome center Joe White of San Antonio Taft and guard Andy Leatherman of Spring Klein.

And you can bet there will be more Houstonians and Dallasites on the roster in years to come. The early recruiting word is that Watkins and his staff were in high schools this offseason that had rarely seen an Aggie basketball recruiter walking the halls.

The Aggies have been close to winning several games over the last few years. But with each mounting loss, this team's confidence sank as low as its free throw percentage. And that was shockingly low.

Watkins has a calming influence about him, which should translate into having a calm and cool team. Maybe it stems from his days as a heady player at North Carolina Charlotte or the fact he has tasted success at a program with one-tenth of the resources A&M has, but Watkins seems to know that this job can be better than he even thought it would be.

No other sport at A&M has had so many handicaps as Aggie basketball, but that has all changed now. There are only assets to look at as the program steps into another century.

Once something good begins to happen on the floor, this unknown commodity of Aggie basketball appears poised to take off.

In just a few days, the program hits the ignition switch from a brand new launching pad on the west side of campus.

"I enjoy college basketball," Watkins said. "I'm always excited about getting the season under way."