June 19, 2022
CHN Staff Report
The University of Minnesota intends to narrow its home arena size from 100 feet to 92, which is a “hybrid” size between the bigger international-sized surface and the NHL width of 85 feet.
The school made the plans official at a board of regents meeting earlier this month, as reported by The Rink Live. According to the report, a $14 million budget was approved to make improvements to the arena and shrink the ice size.
It is expected the change will be made in summer of 2023.
The decision follows a trend throughout hockey of eliminating the large ice surface. It was a trend in the early 1990s to build new arenas with Olympic-sized sheets of 200×85, but that trend fell out of favor by the mid-2000s. Even the Olympics has largely gone away from using the larger sized sheet, particularly when NHL players participate.
New Hampshire has plans to also reduce its ice sheet down from 200×100 to a hybrid. Most new arenas built in the last decade-plus have been NHL-sized — such as Colorado College’s new Robson Arena and Penn State’s Pegula Arena. There are a handful at hybrid sizes, such as Boston University’s Agganis Arena and Notre Dame’s Compton Ice Arena.
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