On Fri, 17 Feb 1995, Erik Biever wrote:
 
> Jim Love writes:
> >I'm guessing that the other two Olympic-sized
> >sheets are in the WCHA - perhaps the DECC at UMD, and North Dakota ??  Can
> >someone with better rink sense supply the two "missing rinks" (ohhh, bad
> >pun :-)  Are there actually more than 5 now in use ??
>
> Other WCHA rink with dimensions I'm sure of:
>
> DECC (Minnesota-Duluth), Duluth (190 x 85)
> MacInnes Student Ice Arena (Michigan Tech), Houghton (200 x 85)
>
 
The DECC may be planning on a change however.  The current measurements of
190 x 85 are pretty small, but there isn't a lot of space to go.  There
may be 10 to 15 feet on each side of the ice, but if you go by the
players benches and the scorers table, you only have about 4 feet behind
the players bench and 6 feet behind the scorers table before you get to
the wall.  That would give a maximum of about 95 feet wide, while losing
all of the seats on the floor next to the glass on the sides.  Now, for
the ends.  The way the DECC curves around the corners, we'd be pretty
lucky to get another 10 feet on each end, and if we did, the boards would
have to be right up against the wall, leaving no room for people to get
through, and thereby making it necessary to remove the seats at the ends
on ice level, leaving no seats at ice level, which fans would not be too
happy about.
        Despite the logistics, and the fact that the cooling system
probably isn't designed for that big of a sheet, the rumor is that within
5 to 6 years, a major renovation will take place.  They are considering
an "upper deck" of seats, increasing capacity to 8 or 9 thousand. (We
can't even fill 5400), the bigger ice sheet, as well as a lot of other
things not really ice or hockey related.  I guess we'll just have to wait
and see.
 
Tony
 
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Anthony J. Frolik                            University of Minnesota Duluth
Go Bulldogs!                                   9-14-4 WCHA, 12-15-4 Overall
            My views are not representative of the University.
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