Centre ready to host hoops

The ice hockey rink has been converted into a basketball court.
By JOHN KOVACH
VINDICATOR SPORTS STAFF
YOUNGSTOWN -- Although there is a lot of preparation and work involved to convert an ice hockey rink into a basketball court, that process is just a standard operational procedure in the arena industry.
"This is not a big challenge," said Brad Cleveland, operations manager for the Chevrolet Centre. "It is a standard procedure.
"We can have different events every night. We can go from hockey to high school basketball to college basketball," said Cleveland, whose crew completed the conversion process from the Youngstown SteelHounds' ice hockey rink to a basketball court on Thursday afternoon.
"It took 15 guys seven hours from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. to convert the arena from hockey to basketball," Cleveland said. "This is the first time we did it. It should be even faster next time."
Thanks to Cleveland and his crew, the Chevrolet Centre is ready to play host to its first high school basketball tournament.
The Youngstown-Warren Holiday Basketball Classic -- a four-game meet involving seven of the eight members of the newly-structured Steel Valley Conference -- is set Saturday beginning at 2 p.m.
Flexible for change
"There are no limitations," said Cleveland regarding using the Chevrolet Centre for something different every day. "The only problems would be having a rodeo where you need a lot of dirt. That would take a long time."
Cleveland, 40, a native of Tiffin who has 10 1/2 years of experience managing operations of hockey arenas, said that as soon as the basketball games are over Saturday, his crew will convert the basketball court back to the hockey rink for Sunday's high school hockey games involving the combined Poland-Ursuline-Cardinal Mooney team.
In order to change the arena from hockey to basketball, Cleveland's crew took down the thick, transparent plastic window surrounding the rink, turned down the refrigeration system, placed insulated ice-decking on top of the ice and assembled the basketball court and hoops and adjacent green flooring that were purchased from Wright State University.
Cleveland, a graduate of Tiffin Columbian High who attended Bowling Green State University, said the ice decking is "the No. 1 covering used in arenas. It is designed to insulate the floor from the ice.
"We cover the ice with the decking and then [raise] the chiller to a different temperature [25 degrees] so that it will not go on as often."
He said the standard NHL ice temperature is 21-23 degrees, but that the SteelHounds like it at 20 degrees where it is colder and harder.
From Dayton to Youngstown
The basketball court from Wright State in Dayton is made of 3/4-inch-thick maple wood mounted to 2-by-2-inch wood stripes and comes in 4-by-8-foot sections and fits together tongue-and-groove with pins.
The two hoops are anchored to the ends of the flooring and also held down by 400-pound weights so that they can't tip over. The rims are collapsible.
"A typical floor costs from $100,000 to $125,000, but we paid $10,000 for it. We got a good deal," said Cleveland, who worked for Whirlpool Corporation in Clyde as a materials coordinator for 17 years before becoming operations manager for hockey arenas in Bakersfield, Calif., for eight years and Phoenix for the past 2 1/2 years.
The floor still has Wright State-related lettering and logos, but Cleveland said most of the art work "will be covered by special Chevrolet Court stickers that are especially designed for basketball and are non-slip stickers."
Chevrolet court
Cleveland said that the floor will be converted to an official Chevrolet Centre court probably next summer.
"We will sand it down, repaint it, put on our logos and lacquer it, and [the whole process] will take about 2-3 weeks."
The apex of the floor's 3-point arc is 19 feet from the base line which is regulation for high school and college, but Cleveland said they plan to increase it to NBA distance which is about 23 feet.
He said that the same scoreboard that hockey uses will be used for basketball games.
"The scoreboard is interchangeable for hockey and basketball," said Cleveland, who is glad to be in Youngstown.
He said a friend who told him about his first hockey arena job also told him about the Youngstown opening.
"He knew I wanted to get back to Ohio to be near my kids," Cleveland said.
kovach@vindy.com