ARLINGTON – The basketball floor at Cowboys Stadium is gone but only temporarily.

TOM FOX/DMN

Texas fans cheered the Longhorns on Saturday during the first basketball game played in Cowboys Stadium. The basketball floor will be used just once more, during the NBA All-Star Game in February, before being sold.

After the stadium's first basketball game Saturday, the maple panels were loaded onto trucks and hauled back to the northern reaches of Michigan for storage and refurbishing. Soon, they'll be on the road back south for the floor's last visit to Cowboys Stadium, for the NBA All-Star Game.

"After that, we'll make it available for sale as a used floor," said Doug Hamar, president and CEO of Horner Sports Flooring in Dollar Bay, Mich.

He said some colleges have already inquired about the three-quarter-inch hardwood court used for the game between Texas and North Carolina.

Although the floor will get only two full games' worth of play and a few practices, it will be well into its lifespan by late winter.

"It's not the players running up and down and dribbling the ball," Hamar said. "It's the conversion."

He said assembling, disassembling and sanding the 4- by 8-foot panels takes years off the floor's usable life. He said the typical floor lasts five to 10 years. That's why it'll be sold at a discount after the All-Star Game.

But now the floor is probably headed for the record books. After a sanding and NBA-approved paint job, the hardwood will return in February for what's expected to be a historic game. The NBA All-Star Game is predicted to have 80,000 in attendance, making it the largest crowd ever to see a basketball game in the U.S.

Hamar's company built the court, as well as the Dallas Mavericks' court at American Airlines Center.

The Cowboys had an option to buy the floor and store it for future games, but stadium manager Jack Hill said there was no room for it. The stadium will have a new floor when it hosts the NCAA men's Final Four basketball tournament in 2014.

Hamar said that if Cowboys Stadium books more basketball games next year, officials will start from scratch with another 10,000 square feet of maple.

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