After 82 years of entertaining people all over the world, the world-famous Harlem Globetrotters prepare to bring their flashy basketball performance to Athens tonight in The Convo.

The team’s stop at Ohio University gives many students and city members a chance to experience the world’s longest running professional sports show.

“It doesn’t matter to us how big or small the city is,” Globetrotters guard “Moo Moo” Evans said. “We want to build a relationship with the people of Athens and put on a good show.”

In 1998, the team surpassed all professional sports teams, including those in the MLB, NBA and NFL as the leader for most games played with 20,000 games and counting.

The Globetrotters are universally known for their trademark basketball freestyle that includes slam dunks and half court shots, but the team plans on exciting people in new ways this year.

“The show is a little more modernized,” Evans said, “but the traditional events like the trick shots and water buckets are still a big part of it.”

One thing that has never changed for the Globetrotters is their effort to include the people in the crowd as much as possible.

“Crowd participation is an important part of the show,” Evans said, “That hasn’t changed.”The Globetrotters have played on six continents and in more than 118 different countries, where they have entertained more than 125 million fans around the world.

Tonight’s event was organized by the Center for Sports Administration with the help of Jim Kahler, director of the sports administration masters program. Graduate students Brian Brantley and Whitney Byrd are the co-chairs; they have helped plan and coordinate the event along with the assistance of numerous other graduate students. “This event not only benefits the Athens community and students to have a chance to see a nationally-known show, but it also helps the graduate students get real-world experience on working for such a major project,” Brantley said.

Part of the funds raised from the event will go toward the College of Health and Human Services, and depending on how successful the event is, OU will hope to stay connected with the Globetrotters by bringing them back every three to four years, Brantley said.

As of Monday afternoon, more than 3,000 tickets had been sold for the show.