October 22, 2025 • 16 mins
Hosts Jim Connelly (@jimmyconnelly), Derek Schooley (@derekschooley), and Ed Trefzger (@EdTrefzger) look at sometimes controversial or overlooked topics in our midweek episode called Upon Further Review.
College hockey is experiencing a massive facilities arms race, with programs investing heavily in new arenas. Recent projects range from Union's $55 million M&T Bank Center to Northeastern's planned $300-350 million replacement for Matthews Arena, with notable investments at St. Thomas ($175M), Western Michigan ($100M+), and numerous other schools. The hosts debate whether this spending remains the primary recruiting advantage or if NIL money, revenue sharing, and player development have become equally important.
A major concern: nine-figure construction costs could make college hockey unsustainable and deter program expansion.
A key tension emerges around maintaining atmosphere during upgrades. Smaller, intimate venues like Cornell's Lynah Rink preserve the electric home-ice advantage that massive buildings often lose when they're harder to fill. The hosts note successful examples like UConn's compact arena and Union's decision to stay smaller rather than expand, while acknowledging the challenge of balancing modernization with the historic charm that makes college hockey special.
Find all of our podcasts at USCHO.com/podcasts
College hockey is experiencing a massive facilities arms race, with programs investing heavily in new arenas. Recent projects range from Union's $55 million M&T Bank Center to Northeastern's planned $300-350 million replacement for Matthews Arena, with notable investments at St. Thomas ($175M), Western Michigan ($100M+), and numerous other schools. The hosts debate whether this spending remains the primary recruiting advantage or if NIL money, revenue sharing, and player development have become equally important.
A major concern: nine-figure construction costs could make college hockey unsustainable and deter program expansion.
A key tension emerges around maintaining atmosphere during upgrades. Smaller, intimate venues like Cornell's Lynah Rink preserve the electric home-ice advantage that massive buildings often lose when they're harder to fill. The hosts note successful examples like UConn's compact arena and Union's decision to stay smaller rather than expand, while acknowledging the challenge of balancing modernization with the historic charm that makes college hockey special.
Find all of our podcasts at USCHO.com/podcasts
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:03):
Usccho dot com.
Speaker 2 (00:12):
Welcome to a pond further review for Wednesday, October twenty second,
twenty twenty five. I met Trevskerl alongside Jim Connolly and
Derek Schooley, and this is the podcast where we look
at some of the topics that maybe we didn't get
to on Monday, or something that may be a little
bit more controversial. We tease this one on Monday. What
(00:33):
college hockey's biggest arm race was? Is it nil?
Speaker 3 (00:37):
Is it oh? I don't know, big wads of cash?
Speaker 1 (00:42):
Is it sharing?
Speaker 3 (00:44):
I don't know what it might be.
Speaker 2 (00:46):
Revenue sharing, revenue sharing that can be really big. But
actually private jets, we're gonna ask if the biggest I
mean private jets very good to do everything.
Speaker 1 (00:55):
I mean, I mean it used to be.
Speaker 2 (00:58):
I know that an airstrip is part of your plans
for your new building at Robert Morris, right, and you.
Speaker 1 (01:03):
Just you could look at you could look at the
movie Blue Chips, what cars, Lamborghinis, all that stuff. That's
the arms race, right.
Speaker 2 (01:13):
Wow, Well there's another arms race too. What about and
spending money on buildings and renovations and so forth. I mean,
the whole thing kind of got started or maybe it
got started almost twenty five years ago with the new
Ralph Engels stat Arena, which was one hundred and four
million in two thousand and one dollars, which is probably
(01:36):
creeping up on the high you know, like one seventy
one eighty two hundred million now in our deflated dollars.
But a lot of other teams spending money on buildings.
They just opened the M and T Bank Center at
Union fifty five million, which is pretty reasonable. Sixty five
million is announced for stone Hill, linden Wood's Senteen Ice Arena,
(01:59):
which is more of a community arena, not just for
lynden Wood, but a beautiful building. Nonetheless, I mean they
had the regional there see are that eighty three million,
one hundred and thirty four million at Mullet, which is
a jewel there in the desert. Just opening up the
Lee and Penny Anderson Arena at Saint Thomas one hundred
and seventy five million on that western Michigan. It's going
(02:22):
to also be an events center in Kalamazoo. One hundred
million already spent. According to their head coach in a
conversation with Jimmy, three hundred to three hundred and fifty
million for Northeastern to replace Matthew's arena. That's going to
include more than just a hockey rink. Maine has spent
fifty million on their renovation one at Michigan State, had
(02:42):
a bunch spent Bentlee and Pagola ice arena at Penn
State over the last fifteen years. There are others that
were not even mentioning. But is this a big concern
around college hockey? Is every coach out there who wants
a better building? Are they looking for a new ice arena?
(03:04):
Is it impacting things?
Speaker 1 (03:07):
Up until about a year ago, yes, I think that
that was the way to get everybody something to differentiate
your program from. I think now, I think nils started
to creep in. I think revenue sharing started to creep in.
I think how you develop your players for pros starting
to creep in. I think it's now all of it's
(03:28):
a part of it. I think that the building is
a part of it. I think your your strength coach
is a part of it. Your assistant coaches are a
part of it. I think there's more to it than
just that one thing of a building. I think they
you could take them into the shiny new building toy
that you may have, but there's also other things that
(03:50):
they're going to want to know, especially the high high
level recruits, because I'll tell you I Pagoula is a
lot older than some of the other buildings that that
that Gavin McKenna was being recruited at. But there were
other things that came into play, like nil Also they
(04:11):
went to the Frozen four last year. So there's more
to it than just the building. I think that you've
got to look at the overall aspect, the holistic view
of your program, and I think those are the things
that people look at. Does the building help, absolutely, the
players want to be comfortable, the players want to be
involved in that. But I think that there's more to
(04:33):
it than just that you want to give your student
athlete a great experience. If you don't have a new building,
what are you doing to make sure that you're taking
care of your student athletes? And if you don't have it,
that's what you can work on without putting fifty five
sixty million dollars. You can make an investment that takes
care of your student athletes on a daily basis.
Speaker 4 (04:55):
Really, well, here's my whole thing is when does money
become too much in college hockey.
Speaker 5 (05:01):
Right now, you just talked.
Speaker 4 (05:02):
About the nil money Derek needs this building number. But
if I'm let's just you know, put a hypothetical out there,
I'm somewhere in central United States thinking about adding a
college hockey team, and there's plenty of incentive for me
to do it.
Speaker 5 (05:20):
For number one thing I look at is what's the
bottom line startup cost?
Speaker 4 (05:25):
And if the part of that startup cost is nine
figures into a building, that's a lot.
Speaker 5 (05:32):
So that's the only place.
Speaker 4 (05:34):
I worry about when this becomes an arms race, that
this could be what really keeps a sport from expanding.
Speaker 1 (05:40):
You do.
Speaker 5 (05:43):
It's never going to bring in the money that football
brings it.
Speaker 4 (05:45):
It's never going to bring the money that basketball brings
them from a TV revenue standpoint, from a sponsorship revenue standpoint.
So when I'm an athletic director, when I'm a trustee
of a university, am I now looking at college hockey
as an unsustainable investment? That's the one thing I think
that worries me. But yes, you have to build these
palaces if you want to win some recruiting battles. Yes,
(06:08):
you have to have a good nil war chest if
you want to win these recruiting battles. I think it
all is now kind of going together at the same time,
but it's made the sport almost unaffordable for too many prob.
Speaker 2 (06:23):
What about some schools that or maybe leagues where things
are falling behind with schools. I know that Atlantic Hockey
America has been deliberately working or the members have been
working on improving facilities, but I'm also thinking about a
league I get to travel to a bit, and that's
the ECAC. There's been some stuff done there. We didn't mention,
(06:46):
of course we did mention Union. There hasn't been that
many years that Colgate opened their new facility, Appleton Ice
Arena up at Saint Lawrence has done a lot of
renovations and some great new facilities for student athletes. Dartmouth
has announced some things a few years ago. It's probably
been more than ten years now for RPI, but you
(07:08):
have some aging facilities that need some work. Is it
even a challenge for conferences when they're trying to keep
up with maybe what's happening in the Big ten, for example.
Speaker 1 (07:21):
I think one of the things that you have to
look at is you don't want to get rid of
the historic element of a building. You don't want to
get take away the charm of lineup. I had a
really good conversation with Dan Barsolomeo at Western Michigan. One
of the neat things that Western did they started a
(07:42):
loss in lunatics, and you saw the loss and lunatics
come out at the frozen form. How when they go
to from a four thousand seat building to an eight
thousand seat building, are they going to be able to
continue that fan base, that atmosphere, that excitement with that
they're on the side, they're down the side from blue
(08:05):
line to blue line. Those are prime seating. That's the
most expensive seats in the building. So now you build
a five hundred million dollar building, how are you going
to put them there? So he said, we are working
with the president of Loss and Lyntics, their board, with
their student board to make sure that we're putting them
(08:26):
in the right places and working with them. They were
involved in the groundbreaking ceremony the president of their student association.
So I think that there's a you don't want to
lose the charm in a line in a Thompson. I
think it's Thompson Arenette Dartmouth, I think is what that's called.
(08:48):
You don't want to lose a charm of the Bright
Center at Harvard. You don't want to lose that charm
while expanding a while making it more for the facility
and more for the players and all that stuff. So
I think that there's a fine liner walking when you're
doing some of this stuff. I hope that makes sense.
Speaker 3 (09:10):
I can no, it doesn't.
Speaker 2 (09:12):
I can speak from experience on that seeing what happened
with rit with Ritter Arena Great which was twenty one
hundred seats and a smaller than NHL size ice surface,
twenty one hundred capacity maybe fifteen hundred people could cram
in there and seat and then a lot of standing
(09:32):
around the outside. Now Geene Polasini Center with forty three
hundred takes a lot more people to get that filled
up and get the atmosphere now when it's full, like
we saw a couple of seasons ago when it was
ninety eight point five percent attendance on a sold out
game for the league championship. It was, But you get
(09:52):
people in there, and let me put a plug in
for that arena for the women's team at rit because
I saw what can happen with atmosphere. For that last
Friday night as part of homecoming weekend, they played Saint
Lawrence beat them four to one. Saint Lawrence ranked at
the time they had one and forty seven attendance, which
(10:13):
set a record for that team. And here's this Atlantic
hockey school. It's right now fourth in the country in
average attendance among women. You get that number in there,
you get girls, you Thaki in there, and a lot
of students. You can build an atmosphere, but it takes
a while from something that was naturally too small and
(10:34):
very loud into a bigger and more comfortable arena to
make that transition.
Speaker 4 (10:41):
I think that's a really strong point too, because look
at the schools that went small with their reconstruction.
Speaker 1 (10:50):
Union we just mentioned.
Speaker 5 (10:52):
Bentley certainly goes into that.
Speaker 4 (10:55):
Quinnipiac got bigger when they build the arena, but it's
still in good thighs for them, not an overly you know,
large building hard to fill.
Speaker 5 (11:04):
But I go back to places like I think I always.
Speaker 4 (11:06):
I grew up in Walter Brown Arena at Boston University,
and that was one of the toughest buildings to play in. Again,
as I'm not gonna call it easy, but it is
easier because it takes a really big, powerful, excited crowd
to make to kind of even come close to matching
that atmosphere. So when these schools build and they want
(11:29):
to get into the big capacity buildings, that's when I
think you even get more of a problem because you're
you're almost taking away some of the whole mice advantages.
I could never imagine al Fond Arena not being in
Maine and they just did that massive renovation. It'll be
a better building, but that building is all atmosphere. I
think line a Rink at Cornella is another example. So
(11:52):
there's ways to build and there's ways to improve, and
I think sometimes the improvements are are more beneficial if
you can maintain atmosphere. You don't want to lose that
great advantage of all I loved.
Speaker 1 (12:07):
I loved Ritter Arena. I thought Rita Arena, the electricity
in that old place that was off the charts, and
I think you lose a little of that going to
Jean Policy any Center and it's still pretty a nice building,
but you just lose that intimacy and that comes from
going to Yost. Now I'm going to go from Yost
(12:28):
to the newer building at South Bend at Compton Family Arena, which,
believe it or not, it's now close to twenty years
old and that's crazy to think that's been almost twenty years.
And what do you I guess it comes down to,
is what's your preference. Do you want the new shiny
toy or do you want the historic charm? And that's
(12:51):
what's your preference, because they're all got something you like
in it in.
Speaker 3 (12:57):
A different way. We forgot to mention Yukon.
Speaker 2 (13:00):
Yukon went from a building without charm to a fairly
compact arena for Hockey East standards and that's been terrific.
Speaker 5 (13:12):
You know.
Speaker 4 (13:12):
You raise a really good point there too, and I'm
glad you brought that up, ed because when Yukon was
being considered, Hockey East had a standard that you had
to have four thousand seats in the building. And Steve
Medcalf was becoming the commissioner about the same time as
the groundbreaking. He was commissioner when the ground was broken,
(13:35):
and you know, it felt like a negotiation, you know,
and there was maybe maybe we'll let them play some
men's games here. Well, now you play almost the entire
Yukon Holme slate there. The atmosphere is fantastic, and I
don't think anything has taken a step back for the league.
I think the league and Steve Metcalf would agree that
(13:56):
Toscano is everything that league needed.
Speaker 5 (14:00):
And you also have this building that's really ideal.
Speaker 4 (14:02):
For the women's team to play in as well, so
it serves both masters and it keeps the atmosphere in there.
I didn't look up. I don't know what the exact
dollar figure was on that one, but that was another
high price tag. But they did it in a manner
that didn't go so over the top that it was
a building that had no act to conclude.
Speaker 1 (14:24):
Because I know we're getting long. I'm at the point
where we're starting to look at new arenas. If anybody
out there really wants to put their name on a
building and they've got about sixty forty fifty sixty, give
me a call, million, not just sixty dollars million, give
(14:46):
me a call.
Speaker 3 (14:48):
I was going to play.
Speaker 1 (14:49):
I mean, I've been sixty million dollars.
Speaker 3 (14:52):
There's a million people with sixty bucks.
Speaker 1 (14:54):
Yep, we can work something outwork too. I got I
got this we've I got a place put your name,
and we could probably do a lot more for you
than that.
Speaker 2 (15:03):
So I got to mention one more arena, which is
an oversight on our part. I don't know why why
we forgot the state of Connecticut, but what a difference
Martiri Family Ice Arena has made for Sacred Heart University.
I remember the days of them playing in the six
hundred and sixty seat Milford Ice Pavilion and now and
(15:25):
then downtown in Bridgeport and now to have that jewel
absolutely a gorgeous facility. If you ever get to see
what's underneath it for the student athletes and all the
dressing rooms and everything, that's fantastic. And I know that's
made a difference for that program as well.
Speaker 1 (15:44):
Absolutely, yeah, I really did.
Speaker 6 (15:46):
And that was an example in Atlantic Cockey where you
had a big building because you had the access to
the Ahl building down there in Bridgeport, but it was
more beneficial to still build something on campus.
Speaker 4 (15:58):
And I think that is Sacred Heart to the great
job by raising the money for that.
Speaker 2 (16:02):
Yeah, you can't have a big empty building, and I
know that was one of the sad things with American International.
They had a nice Ahl building in downtown Springfield. But
if you only have two or three hundred people in there,
it really is like a cave. But that's one of
the difficulties for a smaller school. But I guess we'll
wrap it up. I don't know if we answered the question.
(16:22):
I guess it's one part of a multifaceted arms race.
We realize maybe there's some other things that are bigger deal.
Well's that's all right. You'll get text messages in the
whole bit. Anyway, we'll wrap it up there. For Jim Connolly,
for Derek Scooley. I'm at Trevsker And this has been
upon further review from usccho
Usccho dot com.
Speaker 2 (00:12):
Welcome to a pond further review for Wednesday, October twenty second,
twenty twenty five. I met Trevskerl alongside Jim Connolly and
Derek Schooley, and this is the podcast where we look
at some of the topics that maybe we didn't get
to on Monday, or something that may be a little
bit more controversial. We tease this one on Monday. What
(00:33):
college hockey's biggest arm race was? Is it nil?
Speaker 3 (00:37):
Is it oh? I don't know, big wads of cash?
Speaker 1 (00:42):
Is it sharing?
Speaker 3 (00:44):
I don't know what it might be.
Speaker 2 (00:46):
Revenue sharing, revenue sharing that can be really big. But
actually private jets, we're gonna ask if the biggest I
mean private jets very good to do everything.
Speaker 1 (00:55):
I mean, I mean it used to be.
Speaker 2 (00:58):
I know that an airstrip is part of your plans
for your new building at Robert Morris, right, and you.
Speaker 1 (01:03):
Just you could look at you could look at the
movie Blue Chips, what cars, Lamborghinis, all that stuff. That's
the arms race, right.
Speaker 2 (01:13):
Wow, Well there's another arms race too. What about and
spending money on buildings and renovations and so forth. I mean,
the whole thing kind of got started or maybe it
got started almost twenty five years ago with the new
Ralph Engels stat Arena, which was one hundred and four
million in two thousand and one dollars, which is probably
(01:36):
creeping up on the high you know, like one seventy
one eighty two hundred million now in our deflated dollars.
But a lot of other teams spending money on buildings.
They just opened the M and T Bank Center at
Union fifty five million, which is pretty reasonable. Sixty five
million is announced for stone Hill, linden Wood's Senteen Ice Arena,
(01:59):
which is more of a community arena, not just for
lynden Wood, but a beautiful building. Nonetheless, I mean they
had the regional there see are that eighty three million,
one hundred and thirty four million at Mullet, which is
a jewel there in the desert. Just opening up the
Lee and Penny Anderson Arena at Saint Thomas one hundred
and seventy five million on that western Michigan. It's going
(02:22):
to also be an events center in Kalamazoo. One hundred
million already spent. According to their head coach in a
conversation with Jimmy, three hundred to three hundred and fifty
million for Northeastern to replace Matthew's arena. That's going to
include more than just a hockey rink. Maine has spent
fifty million on their renovation one at Michigan State, had
(02:42):
a bunch spent Bentlee and Pagola ice arena at Penn
State over the last fifteen years. There are others that
were not even mentioning. But is this a big concern
around college hockey? Is every coach out there who wants
a better building? Are they looking for a new ice arena?
(03:04):
Is it impacting things?
Speaker 1 (03:07):
Up until about a year ago, yes, I think that
that was the way to get everybody something to differentiate
your program from. I think now, I think nils started
to creep in. I think revenue sharing started to creep in.
I think how you develop your players for pros starting
to creep in. I think it's now all of it's
(03:28):
a part of it. I think that the building is
a part of it. I think your your strength coach
is a part of it. Your assistant coaches are a
part of it. I think there's more to it than
just that one thing of a building. I think they
you could take them into the shiny new building toy
that you may have, but there's also other things that
(03:50):
they're going to want to know, especially the high high
level recruits, because I'll tell you I Pagoula is a
lot older than some of the other buildings that that
that Gavin McKenna was being recruited at. But there were
other things that came into play, like nil Also they
(04:11):
went to the Frozen four last year. So there's more
to it than just the building. I think that you've
got to look at the overall aspect, the holistic view
of your program, and I think those are the things
that people look at. Does the building help, absolutely, the
players want to be comfortable, the players want to be
involved in that. But I think that there's more to
(04:33):
it than just that you want to give your student
athlete a great experience. If you don't have a new building,
what are you doing to make sure that you're taking
care of your student athletes? And if you don't have it,
that's what you can work on without putting fifty five
sixty million dollars. You can make an investment that takes
care of your student athletes on a daily basis.
Speaker 4 (04:55):
Really, well, here's my whole thing is when does money
become too much in college hockey.
Speaker 5 (05:01):
Right now, you just talked.
Speaker 4 (05:02):
About the nil money Derek needs this building number. But
if I'm let's just you know, put a hypothetical out there,
I'm somewhere in central United States thinking about adding a
college hockey team, and there's plenty of incentive for me
to do it.
Speaker 5 (05:20):
For number one thing I look at is what's the
bottom line startup cost?
Speaker 4 (05:25):
And if the part of that startup cost is nine
figures into a building, that's a lot.
Speaker 5 (05:32):
So that's the only place.
Speaker 4 (05:34):
I worry about when this becomes an arms race, that
this could be what really keeps a sport from expanding.
Speaker 1 (05:40):
You do.
Speaker 5 (05:43):
It's never going to bring in the money that football
brings it.
Speaker 4 (05:45):
It's never going to bring the money that basketball brings
them from a TV revenue standpoint, from a sponsorship revenue standpoint.
So when I'm an athletic director, when I'm a trustee
of a university, am I now looking at college hockey
as an unsustainable investment? That's the one thing I think
that worries me. But yes, you have to build these
palaces if you want to win some recruiting battles. Yes,
(06:08):
you have to have a good nil war chest if
you want to win these recruiting battles. I think it
all is now kind of going together at the same time,
but it's made the sport almost unaffordable for too many prob.
Speaker 2 (06:23):
What about some schools that or maybe leagues where things
are falling behind with schools. I know that Atlantic Hockey
America has been deliberately working or the members have been
working on improving facilities, but I'm also thinking about a
league I get to travel to a bit, and that's
the ECAC. There's been some stuff done there. We didn't mention,
(06:46):
of course we did mention Union. There hasn't been that
many years that Colgate opened their new facility, Appleton Ice
Arena up at Saint Lawrence has done a lot of
renovations and some great new facilities for student athletes. Dartmouth
has announced some things a few years ago. It's probably
been more than ten years now for RPI, but you
(07:08):
have some aging facilities that need some work. Is it
even a challenge for conferences when they're trying to keep
up with maybe what's happening in the Big ten, for example.
Speaker 1 (07:21):
I think one of the things that you have to
look at is you don't want to get rid of
the historic element of a building. You don't want to
get take away the charm of lineup. I had a
really good conversation with Dan Barsolomeo at Western Michigan. One
of the neat things that Western did they started a
(07:42):
loss in lunatics, and you saw the loss and lunatics
come out at the frozen form. How when they go
to from a four thousand seat building to an eight
thousand seat building, are they going to be able to
continue that fan base, that atmosphere, that excitement with that
they're on the side, they're down the side from blue
(08:05):
line to blue line. Those are prime seating. That's the
most expensive seats in the building. So now you build
a five hundred million dollar building, how are you going
to put them there? So he said, we are working
with the president of Loss and Lyntics, their board, with
their student board to make sure that we're putting them
(08:26):
in the right places and working with them. They were
involved in the groundbreaking ceremony the president of their student association.
So I think that there's a you don't want to
lose the charm in a line in a Thompson. I
think it's Thompson Arenette Dartmouth, I think is what that's called.
(08:48):
You don't want to lose a charm of the Bright
Center at Harvard. You don't want to lose that charm
while expanding a while making it more for the facility
and more for the players and all that stuff. So
I think that there's a fine liner walking when you're
doing some of this stuff. I hope that makes sense.
Speaker 3 (09:10):
I can no, it doesn't.
Speaker 2 (09:12):
I can speak from experience on that seeing what happened
with rit with Ritter Arena Great which was twenty one
hundred seats and a smaller than NHL size ice surface,
twenty one hundred capacity maybe fifteen hundred people could cram
in there and seat and then a lot of standing
(09:32):
around the outside. Now Geene Polasini Center with forty three
hundred takes a lot more people to get that filled
up and get the atmosphere now when it's full, like
we saw a couple of seasons ago when it was
ninety eight point five percent attendance on a sold out
game for the league championship. It was, But you get
(09:52):
people in there, and let me put a plug in
for that arena for the women's team at rit because
I saw what can happen with atmosphere. For that last
Friday night as part of homecoming weekend, they played Saint
Lawrence beat them four to one. Saint Lawrence ranked at
the time they had one and forty seven attendance, which
(10:13):
set a record for that team. And here's this Atlantic
hockey school. It's right now fourth in the country in
average attendance among women. You get that number in there,
you get girls, you Thaki in there, and a lot
of students. You can build an atmosphere, but it takes
a while from something that was naturally too small and
(10:34):
very loud into a bigger and more comfortable arena to
make that transition.
Speaker 4 (10:41):
I think that's a really strong point too, because look
at the schools that went small with their reconstruction.
Speaker 1 (10:50):
Union we just mentioned.
Speaker 5 (10:52):
Bentley certainly goes into that.
Speaker 4 (10:55):
Quinnipiac got bigger when they build the arena, but it's
still in good thighs for them, not an overly you know,
large building hard to fill.
Speaker 5 (11:04):
But I go back to places like I think I always.
Speaker 4 (11:06):
I grew up in Walter Brown Arena at Boston University,
and that was one of the toughest buildings to play in. Again,
as I'm not gonna call it easy, but it is
easier because it takes a really big, powerful, excited crowd
to make to kind of even come close to matching
that atmosphere. So when these schools build and they want
(11:29):
to get into the big capacity buildings, that's when I
think you even get more of a problem because you're
you're almost taking away some of the whole mice advantages.
I could never imagine al Fond Arena not being in
Maine and they just did that massive renovation. It'll be
a better building, but that building is all atmosphere. I
think line a Rink at Cornella is another example. So
(11:52):
there's ways to build and there's ways to improve, and
I think sometimes the improvements are are more beneficial if
you can maintain atmosphere. You don't want to lose that
great advantage of all I loved.
Speaker 1 (12:07):
I loved Ritter Arena. I thought Rita Arena, the electricity
in that old place that was off the charts, and
I think you lose a little of that going to
Jean Policy any Center and it's still pretty a nice building,
but you just lose that intimacy and that comes from
going to Yost. Now I'm going to go from Yost
(12:28):
to the newer building at South Bend at Compton Family Arena, which,
believe it or not, it's now close to twenty years
old and that's crazy to think that's been almost twenty years.
And what do you I guess it comes down to,
is what's your preference. Do you want the new shiny
toy or do you want the historic charm? And that's
(12:51):
what's your preference, because they're all got something you like
in it in.
Speaker 3 (12:57):
A different way. We forgot to mention Yukon.
Speaker 2 (13:00):
Yukon went from a building without charm to a fairly
compact arena for Hockey East standards and that's been terrific.
Speaker 5 (13:12):
You know.
Speaker 4 (13:12):
You raise a really good point there too, and I'm
glad you brought that up, ed because when Yukon was
being considered, Hockey East had a standard that you had
to have four thousand seats in the building. And Steve
Medcalf was becoming the commissioner about the same time as
the groundbreaking. He was commissioner when the ground was broken,
(13:35):
and you know, it felt like a negotiation, you know,
and there was maybe maybe we'll let them play some
men's games here. Well, now you play almost the entire
Yukon Holme slate there. The atmosphere is fantastic, and I
don't think anything has taken a step back for the league.
I think the league and Steve Metcalf would agree that
(13:56):
Toscano is everything that league needed.
Speaker 5 (14:00):
And you also have this building that's really ideal.
Speaker 4 (14:02):
For the women's team to play in as well, so
it serves both masters and it keeps the atmosphere in there.
I didn't look up. I don't know what the exact
dollar figure was on that one, but that was another
high price tag. But they did it in a manner
that didn't go so over the top that it was
a building that had no act to conclude.
Speaker 1 (14:24):
Because I know we're getting long. I'm at the point
where we're starting to look at new arenas. If anybody
out there really wants to put their name on a
building and they've got about sixty forty fifty sixty, give
me a call, million, not just sixty dollars million, give
(14:46):
me a call.
Speaker 3 (14:48):
I was going to play.
Speaker 1 (14:49):
I mean, I've been sixty million dollars.
Speaker 3 (14:52):
There's a million people with sixty bucks.
Speaker 1 (14:54):
Yep, we can work something outwork too. I got I
got this we've I got a place put your name,
and we could probably do a lot more for you
than that.
Speaker 2 (15:03):
So I got to mention one more arena, which is
an oversight on our part. I don't know why why
we forgot the state of Connecticut, but what a difference
Martiri Family Ice Arena has made for Sacred Heart University.
I remember the days of them playing in the six
hundred and sixty seat Milford Ice Pavilion and now and
(15:25):
then downtown in Bridgeport and now to have that jewel
absolutely a gorgeous facility. If you ever get to see
what's underneath it for the student athletes and all the
dressing rooms and everything, that's fantastic. And I know that's
made a difference for that program as well.
Speaker 1 (15:44):
Absolutely, yeah, I really did.
Speaker 6 (15:46):
And that was an example in Atlantic Cockey where you
had a big building because you had the access to
the Ahl building down there in Bridgeport, but it was
more beneficial to still build something on campus.
Speaker 4 (15:58):
And I think that is Sacred Heart to the great
job by raising the money for that.
Speaker 2 (16:02):
Yeah, you can't have a big empty building, and I
know that was one of the sad things with American International.
They had a nice Ahl building in downtown Springfield. But
if you only have two or three hundred people in there,
it really is like a cave. But that's one of
the difficulties for a smaller school. But I guess we'll
wrap it up. I don't know if we answered the question.
(16:22):
I guess it's one part of a multifaceted arms race.
We realize maybe there's some other things that are bigger deal.
Well's that's all right. You'll get text messages in the
whole bit. Anyway, we'll wrap it up there. For Jim Connolly,
for Derek Scooley. I'm at Trevsker And this has been
upon further review from usccho
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