National Sports Center Blog

Taste of Blaine is the NSC's tastiest event

By Barclay Kruse, NSC Chief Communications Officer

Last night was the big Taste of Blaine at the Schwan Center. This annual event is one of the most festive -- and tasty -- events on our non-sport calendar. Over a thousand attendees tasted samples from over 35 area restaurants. Taste of Blaine is a fund-raiser for Free2B!, a local charity that provides cars and car-care assistance to help individuals and families in Anoka County Minnesota to achieve economic security and self-sufficiency by supporting them in their transportation needs.

At the NSC, we love hosting this event. First, Free2B! is a unique charity that has identified a key area that low-income families need to hold jobs and become self-sufficient -- reliable transportation. We also love Taste because it's one of those unusual events that draws a lot of people who otherwise haven't visited our campus before. (In other words, we love to show off, especially to new customers!)

Here are some shots from Taste of Blaine 2012:

Below: Tim Cary, of the Tavern in Blaine, shows off salad samples.

Pepe Lusarreta and Cary Kemmerer of Chili's in Blaine:

NSC video producer Jake Frantzen interview Free2B!'s executive director Gary Levine for an upcoming episode of NSCtv.

Brian Lang, of Buffalo Wild Wings in Blaine, proudly serves up some ... wings!

"Eat Sleep Hockey" film premier Feb 29 showcases NSC partners

By Barclay Kruse, NSC Chief Communications Officer

Circle your calendar for February 29. That's the day a new hockey documentary film, "Eat Sleep Hockey" will have its premier showing. The premier will be held at the Andover Cinema, 1836 Bunker Lake Blvd., Andover, MN 55448, starting with a meet and greet with the cast and crew at 5:30 p.m and the national premier of the film at 6:30 p.m.

The film was directed and edited by Damian Kussian and the talented folks at North Metro 15 Television in Blaine. The film follows two hockey families one each from rival schools Blaine and Centennial, over the course of several months of, well, eating and sleeping hockey.

Representing Blaine in the film is the Brodzinski family, who own Hockey Central in Blaine, a Schwan Super Rink sponsor. Dad Mike played at St. Cloud State in the 1980's for the legendary Herb Brooks. Sons Jonny and Mike starred at Blaine High School, with Jonny headed for St. Cloud State next year and Mike verbally committed to the Golden Gophers in two years. Younger brothers Easton is a 9th grader on the Blaine High School JV team and Bryce plays on the BYHA pee wee team.

Facing off on the Centennial side of the rivalry in the film is the Hughes family of Lino Lakes. Dad Terry played at Mankato State, now Minnesota State-Mankato. He is the president of the Skate To Excellence AAA Hockey Program that rents over 500 hours of ice a year at the Super Rink, enters teams in NSC tournaments, and holds their annual golf tournament at the NSC's Victory Links. Kids in the Hughes hockey family are Trey, who currently plays for the El Paso Rhinos of the Junior A Western States Hockey League; Colin, a sophomore on the Centennial team; and Gabby, a talented 12U girls player.

Click here to see the trailer.

Proceeds from the premier will benefit the Blaine and Centennial Youth Hockey Associations.

Presidential candidate Rick Santorum visits the NSC

By Barclay Kruse, NSC Chief Communications Officer

It's party caucus day in Minnesota, and presidential candidate Rick Santorum made a brief campaign stop in front of about 200 supporters at the NSC's Schwan Center today.

The NSC has been a frequent stop for political candidates over the years. Among others, we've hosted President George W. Bush, candidates John McCain, Tim Pawlenty, Elwyn Tinklenberg, and Jesse Ventura. Besides great facilities and a professional staff to help set up the event, we have one thing that candidates love -- free parking!

These campaign events are often organized on short notice. We only learned about this yesterday afternoon, and that's not unusual in this business. Jeff Kapeller, the NSC's Host Services Account Manager, and the entire NSC operations staff did a great job getting everything organized on short notice.

From the NSC's perspective, hosting a political event is great publicity for us. There is usually lots of media coverage, and sometimes even national coverage (as there was today.) And the reporters who cover political campaigns come from a different part of the newsroom than the sports reporters who usually cover our events.

So when it comes to welcoming candidates, we are decidedly nonpartisan. Se try to treat all candidates, their staffs and their supporters the same -- well!

Here are some photos of Rick Santorum's visit this afternoon.

Below, news cameras line up to shoot Santorum's entrance:

Television cameras along the back wall of the Grand Hall. They'll shoot the entire event, and then use ten seconds of video on the news tonight!

And there's the candidate in person:

And after a short speech, it was time for Santorum to meet his supporters:

 

Walls are going up for the new Sport Expo Center

By Barclay Kruse, NSC Chief Communications Officer

It's a big week for construction for our new Sport Expo Center at the NSC. After pouring footings last week, Kraus-Anderson, our contractor, and Fabcon, the manufacturer of the building walls, started tipping up the new walls yesterday. Suddenly, we have a building going up, and it's happening fast!

This new building, projected to open in early June, will host sports training (it'll have short turf on the floor), shows and expos, and during Schwan's USA CUP, it'll be the new home of the PUMA World Store.

Check out how much they've done in just two days!

Below: here's the view of the south wall, the side that faces the stadium field.

Another view of the south wall, this time shot from the top row of the stadium:

Photo shot from what will be the northwest corner of the building, taken from the NSC's mail parking lot:

This view, from the main parking lot, shows what will become the entry lobby to the left:

NSCtv producer Jake Frantzen tapes an interview with host Scott Clasen (left) interviewing project manager Kris Bjerkness, for a segment that will run on this week's NSCtv.

Minnesota's new concussion safety law requires training for coaches

By Barclay Kruse, NSC Chief Communications Officer

In September 2011 a law went into effect in the State of Minnesota that requires all coaches and officials involved with all youth sports to be trained in concussion awareness, safety and protection. Minnesota is one of 33 states that have adopted laws relating to concussion safety in youth sports. Most of these laws are brand new -- 28 new states added concussion laws in 2010 or 2011. So even if you're unfamiliar with the specifics of Minnesota's law, you may be familiar with a similar law in your own state or province. And if not, you're likely to be affected soon.

If you're interested, the safekids.org website has great information on what's happening in each state across the U.S. Every law is a little different, but they all have a common goal of 1) education and prevention 2) assessment and 3) minimizing long-term risk. The big difference between the laws is what they require in compliance. Minnesota's law requires coaches to complete an online course developed by the U.S. Center for Disease Control and Prevention.

The youth sports programs of the National Sports Center, including our youth hockey and soccer programs, fall under the new Minnesota law. If you'd like to read the text of the law you can click on the link for Minnesota Statue 121A.37.  

All coaches will need to complete an online training course. The U.S. Center for Disease Control and Prevention has a free, online course entitled “Concussion Training for Coaches (and referees)”. Click on the link to go to the free course. It takes about 30 minutes, and it contains some great information. Once you complete the course, the certification applies for three years.

If you register for a youth program at the NSC, you'll see a box that you'll need to check verifying that the coaches for your team have completed the training. You'll need to check the box before you'll be allowed to proceed with your registration.

If you have completed a different training course in your state or country that is equivalent to the C.D.C course, you can go ahead and check the box.  

The NSC fully supports this new law as an important step to address a health issue in youth sports. Does this require a little extra effort for coaches to comply with the new law? Yes. Is the extra effort worth it? Yes again!

 

Sport Expo Center construction update

By Barclay Kruse, NSC Chief Communications Officer

After a brief construction hiatus over the holidays, crews are back on the job building the NSC's new Sport Expo Center. This 21,000 square foot building will be big enough to accommodate sports programming like camps, instruction and small-sided games. With space for about 130 booths, it'll also become the NSC's prime venue for shows and expos, like our Great Waters Fly Fishing Expo and the Minnesota Bass Expo. Opening is tentatively set for early June. At Schwan's USA CUP in July, the Expo Center will be the new home for the PUMA World Store.

We went out today and checked on construction progress. The crew from Kraus-Anderson Construction was busy preparing for the pouring of footings. That'll take a week or so. Once that stage is completed, walls will start going up!

Here's a high view of the site from the top row of the stadium:

Below: the crew is preparing the footings along the north wall.

New NSC outdoor sports expos coming

By Barclay Kruse, NSC Chief Communications Officer

Last spring, the National Sports Center partnered with the Tom Helgeson family and took over the hosting and production of the Tom Helgeson's Great Waters Fly Fishing Expo. We've hosted outdoor shows on our campus before, but they were rental events, owned and produced by outside producers. The fly fishing expo was our first experience at producing our own show -- selling the booth space, coordinating the educational seminars and promoting ticket sales. 

If you attended that show, you know it was a great success. The booth space sold out, the Schwan Center was packed with attendees, and the weather was balmy enough that we even did some fly casting training outdoors on our stadium field.

Below: Fly casting instruction outdoors at the 2011 Great Waters Fly Fishing Expo:

On the heels of the success of the Fly Fishing Expo, we assigned Greg Savino, our Campus Development Manager, to develop a full calendar of outdoor shows. We're jumping into the business with two shows in 2012 -- the Great Water Fly Fishing Expo will return on March 23-25, and the new Minnesota Bass Expo will premier on April 20-22, in the indoor Sports Hall. 

Below:Very soon you'll be able to pick up a discount coupon for the Fly Fishing Expo and the Bass Expo at metro area Subway stores.

The Great Waters Fly Fishing show has sold out its booth space already, and the Bass Expo should fill up soon. In 2013, both these shows will move into the new Sport Expo Center that is currently under constructionn and projected to open in early June.

In the meantime, you can follow our growing menu of outdoor shows at the NSC by checking in on the outdoor expo page on the NSC website.

Heroic winters at the NSC? Not so much this year.

By Barclay Kruse, NSC Chief Communications Officer

We know that many of you who visit the NSC in the summer, during Schwan's USA CUP for example, are curious about what the NSC campus looks like in the winter. From time to time on this blog, we've posted photos of recognizable landmarks around the campus buried in snow. It's fun for us, because Minnesotans are not, by nature, overly dramatic folks. So sharing a little bit of weather drama makes us feel a bit heroic!

And I'm here to tell you last winter was the real deal, a heroic winter. During the 2010-11 winter, the Twin Cities received nearly 90 inches of snow, making it the fourth snowiest winter on record.

But Minnesota winters aren't always like that. Just to prove it, I took a walk around the campus today. I went without a coat, because the temperature topped out at 46F! To date this winter we've received just 10 inches of snow (compared to 44 inches on this date last year), and most of that 10 inches has melted long ago. Take a look at some of the photos I shot on my walk, compared to the same scenes about one year ago.

First, here's the one plowed lane through our main parking lot in early January 2011:

And the same scene today:

And the C fields a year ago:

And today: (No, we're not scheduling games outdoors, but we probably could!)

And finally, the Super Rink parking lot last winter:
And today:

But don't dispair snow lovers. The odds are the NSC will get a snow dumping at some point this winter. And we'll be there to heroically bring you the photo evidence!

 

Checking in on the USA Women's National Team camp

By Barclay Kruse, NSC Chief Communications Officer

The USA Women's National Hockey Team ended their Winter Camp this morning, with a spirited game. The Blue Team got the better of the White Team 3-2. After a few words from head coach Katey Stone, the players and staff posed for their official team photo, and most headed to the airport to rejoin their college or pro teams. The next big tournament for Team USA is the Women's World Championship in Burlington, Vermont, April 7-14, where USA will be the defending champion.

Here's a photo gallery from today's scrimmage:

Two photos below: White team goalie Brianne McLaughlin, a 2010 Olympian, looking strong in goal.

Below: Blue team coach Laura Halldorson watches the action. #18 in the foreground is Jordan Smelker, who plays for RPI.

Below: Young fans give encouragement to Anne Schleper as she goes onto the ice for the third period.

Below: Team meeting with USA head coach Katey Stone immediately following the game.

And then it was time for the players and staff to gather for the official team photo!

 

 

NSC kicks off Toys For Tots Drive

By Barclay Kruse, NSC Chief Communications Officer

The NSC just kicked off our Toys For Tots drive! We have set up donation boxes at the Schwan Super Rink, Sports Hall and at the NSC office lobby. We'll be collecting toys through Sunday, December 18. Help us collect a mountain of quality toys for those in need!

Below: NSC Marketing Director Scott Clasen prepares the Toys For Tots collection boxes.

Below: NSC gathers to celebrate the donation of the ceremonial "first toy," a Lego Space Shuttle set. NSC Receptionist Mary Jane Kunza does the honors.