Sylmar, Calif.-based Tutor Perini, along with 28 Arizona-based subcontractors, extended the arena’s upper concourse, and added permanent as well as portable retractable seating in just 160 days. Renovations were also completed on the arena floor to accommodate different preassembled flooring for basketball and volleyball games. Life-safety improvements were also made throughout the facility, and the arena received minor upgrades including paint and concrete and tile repair.

“I’m in awe of what they were able to do,” said Brian Mueller, the university’s president and CEO. “It was very important for us to have the arena available at the start of the school year.”

Speaking with GCU Today in April 2014, Mueller also noted the project’s seamless quality. “It doesn’t look like a retrofit. It doesn’t look awkward, and that’s big,” he said. “The construction group came through. And it was under budget and in advance of what was agreed to.”

“This has been a great project for Tutor Perini,” said Mike Maland, project manager for Tutor Perini Building Corp. “To complete the expansion ahead of schedule and under budget was a team effort by the architectural team, subcontractors and craftspeople. GCU’s executives played a significant part in our success through their accessibility and ability to make swift decisions.”

The private, for-profit, Division 1 school announced plans to double it’s enrollment from 2013 to 2016, bringing enrollment to roughly 15,000. In an effort to attract more students, and accommodate them, the university has embarked on multiple large-scale building projects.

In 2011, the school completed construction on the original incarnation of its arena. The same year crews broke ground on the new College of Arts and Sciences classroom building. In Feb. 2013, GCU officials also announced that a four-story, 58,000-square-foot addition to the existing Student Union would follow, expanding dining and other services for the growing student population.

Just three months later, the school kicked off a slew of summer construction projects. In addition to the two new five-story residence halls already well underway, the school also announced the construction of a new 33,700-square-foot classroom building, as well as plans to relocate the school’s library to the newly expanded Student Center.

The school is also in the process of developing a second campus in Mesa, and is in talks to develop satellite campuses in Tucson, Las Vegas and Albuquerque after the Mesa campus is established.

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