See: the arena transformed from an ice palace into a basketball court and later a handball court

Vilnius “Twinsbet” Arena, the capital’s largest event space, has shared an accelerated video on its social networks showing one of the most exciting transformations of the arena’s space – the transformation of the hockey rink into a basketball court and later a handball court. You can watch the video here.

The 1 min. 30 sec. video captures a 7-day period in the arena’s life, during which the main space of the building is transformed from a hockey rink to a basketball court and from there to a handball court, where Lithuanian handball players will play on Thursday.

The 2024 IIHF Ice Hockey World Championship Division I Group B ruled over the capital from 27 April to 3 May at the arena, featuring the national teams of Lithuania, Spain, Ukraine, the Netherlands, China, and Estonia.

Fifteen games were played in the week-long tournament, and the Lithuanian hockey players, after four wins out of five, lost to the Ukrainians in the deciding clash and won silver medals, one step away from advancing to the higher division.

On the morning of 4 May, the transformation of the space began so that on the morning of 5 May, it could host a basketball training session, and 42 hours later, a match between Vilnius “Wolves Twinsbet” and Kaunas “Žalgiris”.

“The preparations for the championship took about two weeks because, during international tournaments, it is important not only to have a pitch but also to have additional changing rooms, transform existing ones, and set up workplaces for media. At that time, we had about a day to disassemble everything. This is not the first time we have hosted a hockey championship at the arena, so it was not a big challenge,” says Kastytis Šliužas, the arena’s events implementation manager.

On Sunday morning, basketball players were already practicing in the arena. After about seven hours, the Lithuanian Basketball League game took place. Vilnius “Wolves Twinsbet” club, playing at home, dramatically defeated the national champions from Kaunas with a score of 97:93.

“After the hockey tournament, the refrigeration was replaced by heating to melt the ice, and on the first night, we sorted out the cameras, wiring, and other details. On Saturday morning, the disassembly of the rink began, with 30 people and two tractors working in two shifts to break up the thawed ice. The hockey rink is 1800 square meters, and the ice thickness is 5-6 cm so that you can imagine the amount of ice,” adds K. Šliužas.

On Thursday, handball will reign supreme in the arena’s main hall, which was, until recently a hockey rink and a basketball court. The Lithuanian and Hungarian national teams will play their important 2025 World Cup qualifying matches here.
With up to 13,500 spectators during concerts, the capital’s largest event space can accommodate around 10,000 spectators during basketball matches and around 8,000 spectators during ice hockey matches.