Goon's World: Cedar Rapids

Showing posts with label Cedar Rapids. Show all posts

Sunday, January 04, 2015

USHL Arena Review: Viaero Event Center - Kearney, NE

About the Viaero Event Center

Located just off the highway on the south side of Kearney, NE, the Viaero Event Center is home to the USHL's Tri City Storm and has been since it opened in November of 2000. It seats just over 4,000 people and is used for much of the same events as a typical Civic Auditorium would be utilized for (craft fairs, concerts, basketball, etc.).

The Facility

Overall, this seemed to me to be a rather small facility with much of the basic amenities shoehorned in. For example, the Will Call Booth is simply a counter placed in the entrance foyer of the arena. Since there is no space in the foyer for anything resembling a line, this meant that the lines for tickets went out the door quite a ways. Since it gets as cold as a typical North Dakota winter in central Nebraska, this makes for a rather poor start to an experience.

The seats, flooring, and facilities in general though are pretty good. The building itself resembles Cedar Rapids' arena in many ways (similar roofing and ceiling infrastructure and similar seating for example). The bathrooms were clean (which is no small feat considering what you usually find in sports arenas).

There are luxury boxes in this arena, which is the first I noticed since Ralston. There's not much in the way of amenities in these boxes, just movie theater style chairs and servers. This isn't bad, if the price matches what you get. Ralston's suites are rather pricey for what you get.

Grade: B-

Ice

Well, for every good thing, there's bad. Viaero Event Center has possibly the WORST ice in the USHL. The only reason why there's doubt is because I haven't been to every arena yet. Forget the puck jumping all over the place... that happens. But when players and refs can't skate half the time and are sliding into boards and falling down just trying to turn (and even sometimes when they're not)... the ice was just dreadful. I have no idea why there is such incredible problems with their ice, but upon talking to several Kearney residents and Tri City season ticket holders, they all agreed that the ice is a huge problem. I'm just not sure why this arena, which cost approximately $10.5 million in 1999 and was built for hockey and ice skating, would have such horrible problems. Des Moines' arena, for example, may be long past its useful life, but the ice was fine. They may want to start a capitol campaign to fix this.

Grade: F

Food

I failed in this regard as we did not partake in any food, but I did notice that they served typical arena fare... and they DID serve Coke products!!! They're one of only three arenas (Des Moines and Sioux City being the other two) to serve Coke. However, because I did not partake, there is no grade for this facility at this time.

Entertainment

I went on what could only be called "Kids Night" at the arena... It was "Frozen" Night at Viaero and the first X amount of kids dressed up as Elsa from the movie get a tiara and a wand. They also had photo ops with much of the cast of Frozen and, for some strange reason, Cinderella.

In between the first and second periods, they had a relay race to build a snowman (complete with the Frozen song). In between the second and third periods, they had a chuck a puck promotion.

Most notable in their entertainment: No gimmicks, gags, or over the top nonsense. The entertainment was straightforward and not too "cutesy."

They also gave away some pretty decent prizes like DQ Ice Cream cakes, a month's supply of free car washes, and a free night's stay at a local resort hotel.

Grade: A

The Visitor Experience

As outlandish, over the top Lancer fans, my friends and I went expecting to be razzed a bit because we are loud and proud. What we got instead was friendly tolerance and even some turnabout on the part of some of the fans who sat near us (for example, they'd do our cheer to mock the goaltender back at our goaltender when it was appropriate to do so). The worst jibe we heard was "Go back to Omaha!" This is NOT a hostile crowd if you are a visiting fan... unless you decide to be abusive to them.

Since we happened to go to Kearney in the midst of a potential winter storm, no less than 3 separate fans came up to us with road condition reports and many more wished us safe drives back to Omaha after the game.

These were genuine and kind folks in Kearney. Those fans we did get to speak to were kind, passionate about their team, and great hosts.

In the end, I would NOT hesitate to return to Viaero in the future. However, I'd rather NOT visit in the same weather.

Grade: A+

Overall

The fans were great, the seats were good, the facility (except for the ice and the entrance area) was great. It's unfortunate that the ice quality prevents the Viaero from being one of the better visiting arenas in the USHL. Nevertheless, it is better than Des Moines as a fan to watch the game.

Grade: B

Wednesday, October 15, 2014

Arena Impressions - Cedar Rapids - RW77

Ok, Part II so far.

The Cedar Rapids Ice Arena -- Cedar Rapids, IA

Cedar Rapids Ice Arena, home of the USHL's Cedar Rapids Roughriders, is a modern arena opened in 2000. It seats 4,000 people and has two sheets of ice, as well as a small store that sells Roughtriders merchandise and a decent sized open area that could be used for many different kinds of events.

Though this arena only holds about 600 more than Des Moines, the age of the building isn't the only stark difference between it and Buccaneer's Arena. This arena is adorned with modern seating, projector screens behind both goals, great lighting, and a great feel around the upper walkway.

The walls were festooned with Cedar Rapids alumni like UND forward Michael Parks and LA Kings hero Alec Martinez.

The facility looked very well cared for. Aside for a few random dents in the steel siding (most probably from VERY stray pucks), this arena looked new despite its 14 year old age.

If I were to build a USHL facility on a limited budget, I'd start in Cedar Rapids, IA (knowing full well what palaces Ralston Arena is and what the new rink in Sioux Falls seems to suggest).

Facility Grade: A-. Would be an A+ with an updated scoreboard.

Ice:

Not unlike the facilities, the ice was great. The boards seemed not to be as lively as Des Moines. I think this helped Omaha because the boards seemed to react very similarly to Ralston Arena.

Grade: A

Entertainment

They had a VERY interesting way of doing things pre-game. Even at UND, there wasn't that much to do between the end of warm ups and the opening lineup ceremony. Not at Cedar Rapids. From the minute the last player left the ice until roundabout 3 minutes prior to them stepping onto the ice, there was a nonstop series of montage videos featuring different songs. Some featured highlights from last season. Some featured behind the scenes stuff. Others the history of the franchise. All in all, I was VERY impressed.

Pregame Grade: A

Intermission Entertainment: They had a chuck a puck competition, and a slingshot bowling thing. The chuck a puck was pretty straight forward except the prizes were a bit lame. We did not participate.

The slingshot bowling is always a crowd favorite. And it was done right. Good on them.

Intermission Grade: B+

PA: We met this guy but really, all he had to do (like I said before) was to know the player's names and numbers and pronounce them correctly. He did.

Grade: A

PS: He's a nice guy.

Fanbase:

A LOT more people came to the game in Cedar Rapids than in Des Moines, but I do not recall them announcing it during the game. I'm fairly sure that it was between 2,000 and 3,000 people from the looks of it. Still, there were some empty seats. A lot in our section.

Though we had rumors that Des Moines fans were less than fun, we had no such preconcieved notions about Cedar Rapids. For the most part, we were left alone, just like in Des Moines.

Two exceptions: One fan came and talked to us as a fan of a former Lancer player (Gage Hough, now of UMass Lowell). She was nice. As for the other, these three nagging older ladies did not take too kindly to my razzing the goaltender (The old UND standard (Goalie's Name x3, you suck) and made a rather crude reference of a more homophobic nature. Hey, I'm not sensitive, but if you are going to mock me, at least be original or creative. She wasn't. Sad for her.

Cowbell/Vuvuzela Factor: This arena really pushed cowbells and they were everywhere. Naturally, this concerned me. I shouldn't have been concerned. They knew when to ring the cowbells and when not to and responded to prompts accordingly. There was no gratuitous noise. No one rang them in anyone's ears intentionally or otherwise. It was very well orchestrated. That speaks a lot to a strong, loyal, and well-informed fan base.

Fanbase Grade: A-

Overall Impression:

Omaha's fanbase doesn't travel...especially with the year Omaha's having. However, this was an easy 4 hour drive from Omaha and one that every loyal Omaha fan should make. I would not hesitate in the slightest to return to Cedar Rapids Ice Arena. BTW, even the Roughrider website is cool.

Overall Grade: A-

Sunday, June 30, 2013

Good Day for UND at the Draft (RW77)

North Dakota was well represented today at the draft with all highlighted players drafted and one off the board being drafted.

Here's the breakdown:

Adam Tambellini was drafted in the 3rd round (65th overall) to the NY Rangers.
Keaton Thompson was drafted in the 3rd round (87th overall) to the Anaheim Ducks.
Tucker Poolman was drafted in the 5th round (127th overall) to the Winnipeg Jets.
Luke Johnson was drafted in the 5th round (134th overall) to the Chicago Blackhawks.
Gage Ausmus was drafted in the 5th round (151st overall) to the San Jose Sharks.
Wade Murphy was drafted in the 7th round (185th overall) to the Nashville Predators.

Undrafted UND Draft eligible players were: Drake Caggiula, Cam Johnson (incoming 2014), Trevor Olson, Troy Stetcher, Colton St. Clair, Luke Voltin, Charlie Pelnik, and Jack Rowe.

Surprises

In my opinion, I have no surprises to say because I'm terrible at predicting who will and will not get drafted. I still have memories of thinking Kyle Radke would be a end 4th to mid 5th draft pick and watching him fall straight off the board.

So UND has 6 drafted players from various rounds incoming.

I think this is pretty good considering that this was, according to several "experts" a "down" year for NCAA and NCAA-inbound players in terms of high end talent. Only one player (current WMU recruit Michael McCarron went in the first round. His MJ rights are owned by London of the OHL, btw, so it will be interesting to see if he actually goes to WMU in the fall (my bet is that he won't).

There weren't as many trades as they expected but here are a few interesting ones:

NJ Devils trade the 9th pick overall to Vancouver for Cory Schneider - This pick makes a lot of sense for NJ and absolutely NO sense for Vancouver. Luongo wanted out. Vancouver front office wanted Luongo out. So they trade Schneider. Definitely a head scratcher.

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Wild trade Cal Clutterbuck to the Isles for Nino Neitereider and a pick. This is an interesting trade because you have a tried and true gritty forward being traded for a former first rounder whose offense has been suspect. In other words, it's Risebrough-esque. I've seen Nino play and he's pretty good if you give him space. If you crowd him, he disappears. At best, Nino is another Pierre Marc Bouchard. At worst, he's a nobody.

But probably the worst trade by the Wild had to be Justin Falk for the rights to Benn Ferriero and a 2014 6th rounder. Sorry Wild fans, but Ferriero is another Veillieux in terms of offensive talent. 22 points in 92 NHL games. The Wild do not need defensive forwards... well maybe they do now that Clutterbuck is gone? So they ship away a decent young defenseman for the RFA rights to Ferriero? Yuck. If that pick was a 2013 mid rounder (say 4th-6th round) then I'd say "Ok." But blech.

In wrapping up: Boston College and UND had 6 players drafted last count. That tops them out for NCAA schools. Not too shabby.

Luke Voltin (Lincoln), F Jack Rowe (Cedar Rapids), D Charlie Pelnik (Fargo) - See more at: http://undhockey.areavoices.com/#sthash.dIBFIQKe.dpuf