The University of Wisconsin’s ice hockey facilities left quite an impression on Tracey Cornell when she visited in 1999 to interview for a Lady Badgers’ assistant coaching position.

For one, the Badgers played in the nation’s second-largest college hockey arena, the 15,000-plus capacity Kohl Center. But the women’s team also had its own practice facility, a nearby complex called the Camp Randall Memorial Sports Center.

There, the players had access to an NHL-sized practice rink, a skate-sharpening room and a classroom equipped with practice goals and boards. Adjacent buildings housed a weight room, academic center and training room complete with whirlpools and saunas.

‘Wow – oh yeah, I could coach in a place like this,’ Cornell recalled saying to herself that day. ‘It’s like an NHL facility, basically. I think it plays a huge part in recruiting.’

The Syracuse women’s hockey team likely won’t enjoy a similar advantage when it begins play next fall at the Tennity Ice Skating Pavilion. SU’s athletic department will work with the university’s Department of Recreation Services to renovate the facility before play begins, but its plans do not involve a makeover that will wow recruits like Wisconsin’s facilities did to Cornell.

But that isn’t Syracuse’s primary concern at the moment. Athletics officials simply want to get the team running in a functional facility.

‘In the short term, I think Tennity’s going to be great,’ said Jamie Mullin, SU’s associate director of athletics for team services. ‘We just need to outgrow Tennity first and then move on.’

Syracuse announced in June it would cut its swimming and diving squads to make room for a Division I women’s hockey program. University officials still are looking for a head coach and hope to hire one by March.

Syracuse also has held discussions with several hockey conferences about accepting the Orange, but Mullin declined to reveal the school’s options. The two major hockey conferences in the Northeast are the Eastern College Athletic Conference and Hockey East.

In the meantime, SU is looking into renovation work for Tennity. The facility currently has bleachers on one side of the rink that can seat about 400 fans. The arena also houses four small locker rooms in which players wouldn’t be able to take 10 steps in any direction without hitting a wall. The locker rooms don’t contain individual lockers, so players on SU’s club teams store their equipment in the 54 metal lockers lining a wall behind the bleachers.

Syracuse has a vision for what Tennity will look like by the time its D-I team takes the ice next fall. But there is no concrete timetable on the renovation plans.

Athletics officials have consulted coaches and administrators at other hockey programs, who have pinpointed an impressive locker room as the most important factor in luring potential recruits. Tennity’s home locker room therefore will be refurbished to include wooden lockers, a television, a stereo set and couches.

SU will then convert the remaining locker room space into an equipment room and a training room, as well as construct more bleacher seats to fit about 1,000 fans. A press box that can seat between 10 to 20 people also will be built. But luxuries such as a center-rink scoreboard, instant-replay video board and player lounge are out of the question right now.

‘We’re going to invest some money into the locker rooms,’ Mullin said. ‘If we see a need for some of the more aesthetic things – scoreboard, video board – we’ll take a look at that, but right now, I just don’t think we’re in the position to do that.’

All this work will cost about $1 million, significantly less than what it would have cost to deliver a new natatorium to the swimming and diving teams. Mullin doesn’t have a figure for how much a natatorium would have cost, but in 2005, Louisville opened one, on which it spent $11.7 million.

Syracuse athletics officials have met with representatives from the university’s Office of Campus Planning, Design and Construction, but Mullin doesn’t know if blueprints have been drawn up for the renovations.

How they turn out will play a large part in how well the hockey program takes flight less than a year from now.

‘The competitiveness of recruiting right now, I’ve never watched it where it’s been so evident,’ said Paul Flanagan, head coach of the No. 5 St. Lawrence women’s team. ‘The kids are looking at it from a materialistic view. They want this, they want that. What can you give me?

‘It’s always the constant battle of keeping up with the Joneses.’

Flanagan should know. He took over the St. Lawrence program in 1999 when it was two years old and struggling to draw top talent. The Saints then unveiled a spanking-new locker room in Appleton Arena that year, and Flanagan believes that has played a big role in enriching his recruiting classes.

Individual wooden lockers are just the beginning of the amenities. The Appleton locker room also boasts of a large television set, a stereo system, a projection screen for game films, wall-to-wall carpeting, four stationary bicycles and a refrigerator for the women to stock up on yogurt and drinks.

‘Think about all the time the team spends in there,’ Flanagan said. ‘We make it as homey as possible.’

Wisconsin also provides its hockey teams with services like massage therapy and sports psychology sessions in its sports medicine headquarters, while St. Lawrence hosts weekly yoga lessons for its players in a community room inside Appleton Arena.

In addition, even though the Lady Badgers share their practice facility with physical education classes and intramural games, they always have noon to 6 p.m. blocked off for their use, a nice luxury for players who wish to put in extra work on the ice.

‘If you’re talking about a high-performance athlete, an elite athlete, they obviously want the best resources,’ Cornell said. ‘Kids are looking into what’s available to help them get to the next level, and a lot of that is facilities-based.’

But Flanagan said teams making the transition from club hockey to Division I need not go overboard in embellishing their facilities. A functional locker room and sports medicine services are indispensable; a fancy center-rink scoreboard with instant-replay capabilities is not. Neither are 10,000 extra seats in the stands.

Erika Edwards, a sophomore defenseman on SU’s club team who is considering trying out for the D-I team, also said she would not hold a humble-looking Tennity against the Orange.

‘You have to start with slightly…not lower expectations, but you have to be realistic,’ Edwards said.

And so the Orange women’s hockey team looks destined to begin play as a program with top-class aspirations but without top-class facilities.

For now, SU is looking simply for the program to begin play.

Said Mullin: ‘If we outgrow Tennity, that’s a great problem to have.’

Published on October 24, 2007 at 12:00 pm