When it was announced on the afternoon before the tip-off of Cleveland State’s home match-up against Oakland that the game would be moving from the Wolstein Center to Woodling Gym, it’s understandable that there may have been a lot of old feelings dredged up. The heating went out in the 35-year old venue, and it wasn’t the first time utility problems bedeviled the arena, as electrical issues have cropped up on more than one occasion in recent years.
Woodling Gym is, as the name implies, an actual gymnasium. It’s larger than most (with a seating capacity of 3,500), but it’s still a gym. And any time a game is scheduled there, there’s been an expectation that the crowd would be decidedly diminished and more muted. That was the case when the CSU men faced a pair of Non-Division I teams in the venue earlier in the campaign, and even though this was a conference game against the second-place team in the Horizon League, there was no reason to believe the same reaction would happen here.
But a funny thing happened that Wednesday night. Woodling Gym seemingly transformed into the kind of place older Vikings fans can recall from the 1980s, during the program’s most prominent days when it was led by the late Kevin Mackey.
Down by 11 to the Golden Grizzlies, Cleveland State started chipping away at that lead. A three-pointer by Jaiden Lipscomb here. A Tre Beard three-pointer there. All of a sudden, not only did the Vikings erase the Oakland advantage, they stormed ahead.
And the crowd was into it, big-time. Even though only one set of bleachers was opened, with the other dedicated to Viking Fund donors and buyers of the Downtown Deals tickets, the energy grew to a point where you’d be forgiven if you found yourself getting a glimpse of what it was like during CSU’s Run and Stun era.
In the end, Cleveland State indulged the crowd with a record-setting 17 three-pointers and, more importantly, its fifth win in a row, a feat that two week prior would have been virtually unfathomable, as the Vikings were mired at the bottom of the standings.
The heat has been restored at the Wolstein Center, and CSU’s venture into the past, while entertaining, appears to have subsided for the time being. But it’s worth taking a look at a shift to Woodling and what could be possible.
It’s no secret that for at least a decade, likely longer, Cleveland State has struggled to come up with any ideas on how to address the Wolstein Center and its never-ending drain on university resources. The million-plus dollars a year that the arena costs CSU, at a time when the institution already faces a variety of financial challenges, is unstainable. All parties agree on this, whether you’re a fan, staff, faculty or administration.
And after all this time, it looks as if a resolution to this situation was finally coming to the fore, as USL Cleveland put in a proposal that would convert the Wolstein Center and its adjacent land into a new soccer stadium and mixed-used development. However, negotiations have since died, and the arena shall continue to stand in the near future.
But it appears that CSU is looking at revisiting Woodling as a relocation spot, and with that, the acknowledgment that there would be work that needs to be done beforehand. Upgrades to the locker rooms would have to be a priority, as well as deciding how to best serve its VIPs. There’s also the matter of practice facilities, although the Recreation Center, which is connected to Woodling, does have multiple courts that oftentimes sit unused, or at the very least can be earmarked specifically for practice purposes.
There were times over the years when fans, myself included, viewed a move to Woodling Gym, temporary or permanent, as a sign that CSU was throwing in the towel on athletics. But given what we witnessed during the Oakland game, while it will require soliciting additional funds and perhaps looking at selling naming rights, it could actually work…if Cleveland State plays its cards right.
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