Maximum Capacity
The Syracuse club men’s lacrosse team spends most of its time practicing in the Women’s Building. There are no goals in the gym so the team uses trash cans with no goalies.
‘It’s pretty ghetto,’ said Nick Dodd, club captain and a sophomore landscape architecture major at the State University of New York College of Environmental Science and Forestry. ‘But at least we’re in there passing around.’
Because it’s so hard practicing indoors, three sets of club teams (men’s and women’s lacrosse, ultimate Frisbee and rugby) look to the Carrier Dome for indoor practices because of the increased space. But those club teams are low on the priority list because the facility is already being used more than 15 hours a day for Syracuse varsity athletics.
All of these issues contribute to a winter facility crunch that has varsity and club teams wishing for the spring so they can practice outdoors where space is plentiful.
‘We’re going from 6 a.m. to 10 p.m. every day,’ said Pat Campbell, Carrier Dome managing director. ‘There’s such a demand there isn’t a heck of a lot of time left.’
On a daily basis, the Carrier Dome hosts practices for the SU field hockey team, men’s and women’s soccer, softball, men’s and women’s lacrosse and men’s basketball. The ROTC program also holds twice-weekly sessions in the morning in the Dome.
All but the basketball team practice outdoors when the weather improves in March. But until then, the Dome remains the largest facility on campus for holding team practices. A lot of clubs practice in the Women’s Building’s two gyms.
The task of scheduling all the practice times at the Dome falls largely on Campbell.
At the beginning of January, Campbell holds a meeting with all the varsity coaches. Week by week, they develop the schedule for the Dome, with certain events, such as games and daily basketball practice taking precedent.
On a usual day with as many as seven teams practicing, it leaves little spare time. For the teams and clubs that do practice, only a half to two-thirds of the turf is usable because the basketball court is set up.
Having a reduced field impacts practice, said SU men’s lacrosse coach John Desko.
‘We tend to work more on individual drills,’ Desko said. ‘We do a lot of half setups because we can’t scrimmage.’
Desko said the players welcome a change in weather so the team can practice outside, utilize an entire field and scrimmage. He said practicing outside also helps the team get accustomed to poor weather in case it has to play in it during a game.
‘We try to set up as much field as possible,’ Campbell said. ‘They know the situation. We can’t be set up in full-field mode. Our coaches are great about that.’
Little leftover time complicates a club’s request to practice in the Dome. Syracuse has 47 club teams, six of which request such time.
This week, three hours are reserved for club teams in the Dome. The women’s club lacrosse team is practicing for an hour this morning at 7 a.m. The men’s club lacrosse team will practice for an hour on Thursday at 9 p.m. And the men’s and women’s rugby teams practice for an hour tonight at 9.
Joseph Lore, assistant director of recreation services, handles the scheduling for all the club sports at SU and said that hour slots are reserved for club teams two nights a week. Generally, the timeslot is from 9 to 10 p.m.
‘It’s so helpful for us,’ Lore said. ‘Some of the clubs can only do so much in a gym. It’s better than not having it at all.’
With one or two practice slots a week in the Dome, the six clubs that want to practice do so two or three times during the winter, Lore said.
After Spring Break, the clubs that practice in the Dome and the Women’s Building go outdoors and practice on Coyne Field or Hookway Fields. The clubs receive the slightest change in weather with great happiness – much like the varsity teams do – because it alleviates the space problem.
‘(The clubs would) like to get more and we’d like to give them more,’ Lore said. ‘It’s not the best situation, but it’s good. Other schools have less.’
Lore pointed out that 20 years ago, Syracuse had 20 active club teams compared to 47 now. Only one additional facility (Flanagan gym) has been added in that same time span.
For the clubs teams, securing an indoor facility remains the most difficult because the practice times are always guaranteed for the varsity sports. Dodd and his club lacrosse team have practiced once in the Dome this winter. A second scheduled practice was cancelled because of an event and Lore offered a replacement time at 6 a.m., Dodd declined that time sensing few members of his team would show.
Dodd said they have two additional practices scheduled for the Dome this winter. But when the men’s club lacrosse team does practice, it shares the time with women’s club lacrosse team. So an already small 50-yard patch of turf is shortened to just 25 yards for an hour. To complicate matters, the Dome staff dims the lights while the clubs practice to save money.
‘We have to play by the light given off by the emergency lights that legally have to be on 24/7,’ Dodd said.
Still, Dodd understands that club sports play a secondary role to the varsity teams. But he still wonders why there aren’t more facilities available.
‘You would think at a prominent (Division I) school in the Northeast, they would have more indoor facilities,’ Dodd said. ‘Maybe a new football complex will offer more options.’
The athletic department will begin construction this year on a strength and training facility for the football team. The two-story building will feature free weights and weight machines on the first floor and aerobic equipment on the balcony level.
But the facility will not contain a practice facility, meaning that the new complex won’t do much to alleviate the scheduling problems.
Published on February 20, 2005 at 12:00 pm
