USA Hockey Arena gets ready for Women’s Worlds

By @MichaelCaples –

PLYMOUTH – They have been preparing for more than a year now.

But with the news breaking last night that the Women’s National Team and USA Hockey had reached an agreement, set-up kicked into overdrive in Plymouth.

USA Hockey Arena is getting ready for the 2017 IIHF Women’s World Championship, and staff members couldn’t be happier to have the women heading toward Metro Detroit.

“Lots of excitement,” said Mike Bertsch, assistant executive director of marketing and communications, “because we’ve been working on this for a year of course – the preparations, other things behind the scenes that are being worked on for a regular basis. But with the team coming in, it completes the tournament in terms of the excitement that’s going to occur here in Plymouth and at the arena.

“It’s the best women in the world, and that’s what everybody wants to see. We’ll start off with a bang with the games on Friday, especially the U.S./Canada game. I just encourage everybody to come out and watch and see what’s going to be in the Olympics ten months from now. We’re all excited, ticket sales are starting to take off very quickly here, and we’re excited about that. It means there’s going be a lot of people in the arena. There’s still tickets available so we encourage people to jump on it, but we know it’s going be a fun week.”

MORE: USA Hockey officially announces agreement with Women’s National Team

The tournament – the largest event for women’s hockey outside of the Olympics – begins Friday. At noon, the Czech Republic and Sweden kick things off. At 3:30, Sweden and Germany skate on the main sheet of ice, while Finland and Russia play at 4 on the Olympic side. The U.S. and Canada renew their rivalry at 7:30 in the headliner for the opening day of the tournament.

“Oh it’s great – I think it’s awesome for this building,” said Scott Monoghan, vice president of USA Hockey Arena. “It’s our first really big event for USA Hockey here in our home that we moved to in Michigan, and I think what we’re really looking forward to is seeing a completely different fan base get in here and really enjoy the games.”

The Women’s National Team boycott put a damper on ticket sales for the event, but since the agreement was reached on Tuesday, phone calls and visitors to the USA Hockey Arena box office have steadily increased.

“It took a little bit for the word to get out last night, so we didn’t expect too much,” Bertsch said, “but this morning, right off the bat, ticket sales are taking off. It’s what we expected, we’re happy with it. We know people realize now that the best in the world are going to be here. I think we’re going to see some excellent hockey. You don’t have to travel to Korea to see this one, it’s going to be right here in the backyard in Michigan. They’ll get a chance to see some great hockey.”

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It’s a major moment for USA Hockey and USA Hockey Arena; it’s only the fourth time for USAH to host the event, and it will be the largest to date at their new facility in Plymouth.

“Well, it’s only our fourth time hosting the tournament, second since I’ve been with USA Hockey,” Bertsch said. “It’s the value and the talent of USA Hockey and the women’s program has gone up steadily as I saw it in 2012 in Burlington. Outstanding tournament, the outstanding talent and competitiveness of these ladies is phenomenal. For us, it’s extremely important to host us and have a great event. It helps us to then position ourselves for future events for the IIHF. Any time you can bring a world championship to the table is a special time. It’s a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for a lot of people, to see the best women athletes in the world playing hockey.

“They won’t be disappointed – it’s fun hockey to watch, and the skill level is incredible, the intensity level is phenomenal, so I would encourage people to get out and see some of the games because we don’t see these teams very often… To have one here right in the Detroit area, in Michigan, it’s worth the drive to come out and see it.”

The transformation of USA Hockey Arena is well-underway; Monoghan said it will be good to go for the arrival of Team USA.

“Mainly our event management staff in Colorado, Kevin Couture and Madison Brown leading the way there, just telling us what they want and putting up pipe and drape and get signage up, just a lot of little stuff you don’t notice until you see it, he said. “But it’s getting signage up for the teams, getting situated, moving everybody in this afternoon. Our team will be about the last one in, they’ll practice today and full practice day for everyone tomorrow and here we go.”

The Women’s World Championship coincides with the USA Hockey girls and women’s national playoffs, which will be taking place in Rochester, Macomb and Troy.

“The youth nationals, in fact, that was part of our intention when it was structured, is to have it as close as we could [to the tournament] to give everybody that’s coming to Michigan for the youth nationals an opportunity to come over,” Bertsch said. “We scheduled the games appropriately so it’d be a break for them. We expect that there’ll be a lot of people that, once they’re here for the nationals, will take advantage of bringing their daughters over to see the games because it could be them some day.”