CHARLESTON, WV (WOWK) – For the past two years, The Basketball Tournament (TBT) was held at the Charleston Coliseum and Convention Center in West Virginia’s capital city. However, this year, it will be held in Wheeling at the WesBanco Arena instead.

The past two summers, the tournament has brought in thousands of fans and millions of dollars, but due to a scheduling conflict, TBT 2023 will not be held in Charleston.

“We’re hosting a pretty large international table tennis tournament in July here in Charleston over ten days at the Coliseum,” Tim Brady, President of the Charleston Convention of Visitors Bureau. “Young athletes from North, South, Central America competing here.”

Even though the tournament brought an economic boost to downtown Charleston, Brady said that will not be lost.

“It was two years of exciting basketball in Charleston,” Brady said. “It brought great crowds, put some people in hotel rooms, restaurants were busy, but again we have a lot of things coming up this summer that will probably dwarf the economic impact of TBT, quite frankly, when you look at the international sporting events we’ll be hosting.”

Despite the location change, fans like Christopher Wade are still gearing up for the tenth-annual basketball tournament. Wade said a change in location from Charleston to Wheeling will not change the excitement surrounding the event.

“People get really enthusiastic about their teams, the Mountaineers and the Herd, so they’ll still be super excited and fired up to support their teams,” Wade said. “I’ll go up again. I know a lot of WVU and Marshall fans will too. It’s two and a half hours from Charleston. It’s not too bad, as long as it’s still in West Virginia.”

Brady said it’s possible the tournament could come back to the capital city in the future years, but in the meantime, he’s excited it’s still in West Virginia.