Two years ago, new Illinois Head Coach Bruce Weber was forced to ask security guards to let his wife and daughters into Midnight Madness at Huff Hall.

Nobody in the packed building even recognized the Webers standing at the doors.

Bruce Weber had taken over at the helm of the Illinois basketball team the previous spring, but he and his family still had relative anonymity in the Champaign-Urbana community.

After two years, two Big Ten regular season titles, one Big Ten tournament title and an appearance in the NCAA finals, times have changed.

Some of those changes will be evident this weekend when the Illini kick off their basketball season at Midnight Madness.

For the first time, the event will be held in Assembly Hall instead of Huff Hall to help accommodate the Illinois fan base. The doors will open at 9 tonight and the show includes introductions and scrimmages featuring both the men’s and women’s basketball teams.

Assembly Hall seats 16,500 and will allow approximately quadruple the number of fans than Huff Hall to attend Midnight Madness.

“We were kind of torn. Our players love the atmosphere of Huff (Hall),” Weber said. “But with the interest that we created last year … and everything at a peak, we felt that we could afford to go Assembly Hall.”

The big challenge now, from a recruiting standpoint, will be to pack the Assembly Hall with orange-clad Illini fans.

“There is that fine line because we have to make sure that we have that place full, if we are going to bring recruits on campus,” Weber said.

It has not always been that way. When Weber was initiated into the Big Ten coaching staff as an assistant coach at Purdue, there was little hype surrounding the first practice of the season.

First practices were not nationally televised like this year’s Midnight Madness will be at Kansas, Kentucky, Memphis, Michigan State and Oregon. ESPNU did not exist, let alone turn the first practice of the season into hour-long special events.

But the excitement surrounding college basketball has changed. Some schools invest up to $40,000 on Midnight Madness, Weber said.

Even though coaches can practice with their teams beginning at 7 p.m. and coaches have been allowed limited time to work with their teams over the last two weeks, fans are still expected to fill Assembly Hall tonight.

The first 5,000 fans entering the Hall will receive commemorative posters. The first 8,000 students will receive “Paint the State Orange” T-shirts.

The fans will also experience the one-time opportunity of being able to watch the 2005 Final Four banner be raised to the rafters of Assembly Hall.

For fans who do not have season tickets, this will be one of the few times they will be able to see the Illini play in person. Fans will also get a glimpse of the future of Illinois basketball in the freshman class, while watching how far some of the returning athletes have come since last season’s loss to North Carolina.

“This will be a chance to come out and see the new guys, and to honor the older players, Dee and James – it’s their last go-around,” Weber said. “And we’re excited about it.”

Although Weber’s face lit-up as he addressed media members Tuesday, the head coach seemed more than just excited.

“It’s kind of like New Year’s Eve for basketball,” Weber said. “Along with the celebration and the excitement of the whole event, you want to put on a good show.”

But Weber does not only want to create a good show, he is also aiming to make Illinois basketball a statewide obsession. One of Weber’s goals is “continuing to make Illinois basketball something that the state takes pride in, from Chicago all the way down to southern Illinois and the St. Louis-area,” Weber said.

Tonight, which will feature slam-dunk and three-point contests as well as flashy performances once the scrimmage starts, promises to foreshadow another exciting season.

“We’ll mix it up and let them have some fun,” Weber said. “It’s the one time we don’t yell about defense and match-ups. We actually encourage letting the guys go dunk.”