RALEIGH - Sport is big business, and that's the big reason it's unlikely the Mid-Eastern Athletic Conference basketball tournament will be played at the RBC Center after 2008.

"We can't make it make business sense anymore," said Dave Olsen, vice president and general manager of the RBC Center. "We've had two years of the tournament, ... and we haven't seen the revenue growth we would like to see."

The agreement with the MEAC -- which brought its event to Raleigh in 2006 -- expires after the 2008 tournament, scheduled for March 10-15. Local officials aren't expected to extend the contract, unless somebody pays the $300,000 rent for six days at the RBC Center.

Olsen said Gale Force, which operates the RBC Center, has in the past contributed $300,000 for the MEAC event, the same as it did for the CIAA before that league moved its tournament to Charlotte.

A concert that draws 15,000 people, Olsen said, would generate approximately the same ancillary income as the basketball tournament produces in six days.

A Friday or Saturday night hockey game typically will bring in $300,000 to $400,000, he said.

Scott Dupree, director of sports marketing for the Greater Raleigh Convention and Visitors Bureau, said that although there's a slight chance the MEAC event could remain in Raleigh, it is a long shot.

"I'm not certain the door is completely closed," he said. "It wouldn't surprise me if conversations continued to take place that also involve the MEAC office to see if the situation with the RBC Center can somehow be resolved to Gale Force's satisfaction."

Efforts to reach MEAC commissioner Dennis Thomas, who last week expressed hopes of renewing the contract, were unsuccessful.

The MEAC drew about 22,500 fans in 2006 and approximately 30,000 for the 2007 tournament, creating close to $4.1 million in economic impact. But that paled in comparison to the CIAA event, which attracted about 100,000 in its final year here in 2005 and raised more than $12 million.

The CIAA's departure sent local officials scrambling for a replacement. Raleigh and Wake County each committed $200,000 a year to support the MEAC, and local sponsors contributed about $400,000 more, Mayor Charles Meeker said.

Unlike the CIAA, which includes St. Augustine's and Shaw, the MEAC doesn't have a local drawing card in the field. The closest team to Raleigh is N.C. A&T in Greensboro.

In an effort to increase attendance for the 2008 tournament, the MEAC added a "bonus" men's game pitting N.C. Central and Winston-Salem State to be played the final day of the tournament, between the men's and women's championship games.

"We were just always battling reality versus expectations," Dupree said. "The reality was it's a tournament that has grown here ... but the expectations and perceptions were that 'This isn't as big as the CIAA. What's wrong with it?' "

City Council member James West called it a difficult situation.

"We are really committed from a sentimental point of view to the tournament," West said. "But things have just not gone exactly the way we had hoped. It's a tremendous investment."

City and county officials are looking to organize another event in 2009 to celebrate African-American culture on the scale of Artsplosure, a spring arts festival, or First Night, the annual New Year's Eve celebration. Officials will form a task force early next year to make a plan.

"The bottom line in all of this is we feel that we have a strong commitment from the city and the county to do an alternative annual event that would really bring the African-American community together," West said.

Last year, Brad Thompson, a former City Council member, helped start a local support group for the MEAC. This year, he extended the group to other cities in the Southeast.

Thompson said he would be sad to see the tournament go but added that he's focused on making the 2008 event a success.

"If it's only going to be '08, we're going to make '08 the best party we've had," he said. "Having good basketball here and having first-class tournaments here is a good thing."