Lucia: Mariucci needs upgrades

Don Lucia has watched in-state rivals Bemidji State and Minnesota-Duluth open new arenas in 2010 in his tenure as Gophers men’s hockey head coach.

Even St. Cloud State has plans to break ground in March for updates they approved four years ago to their 22-year-old National Hockey Center.

Now, Lucia said, it’s the University’s turn. Mariucci Arena will host its 20th season next year, and Lucia said he’d like to see some renovations.

“Like any aging arena, [Mariucci] just needs a few tweaks,” Lucia said. “The scoreboard is the big thing. If you go around college hockey or go to the Xcel Center, those are the expectations nowadays.”

However, Lucia said the need for improvements is not new and is “something we’ve talked about for years.” Along with the scoreboard, the coach said he would like to see upgrades to the sound system, weight room and coach’s offices as well as a player’s lounge and video room downstairs.

“It’ll all help, but more than anything else you want to have a great fan experience,” Lucia said. “The scoreboard would make a great experience for our ticket holders.”

Upgraded facilities across the WCHA have left the Gophers missing a crucial piece in the recruiting puzzle as well, Lucia said on his weekly radio show Monday.

“Kids go on a recruiting visit and, you know what, facilities are extremely important,” Lucia said. “You want to be able to have kids come in and look through your arena and have a little bit of that ‘wow’ factor.”

Mariucci was listed as one of the top 10 venues in college sports in 2007 by Sports Illustrated on Campus, but the facility hasn’t had any major improvements since it opened in 1993, Lucia said.

“If something is done, then 20 years later you find out how to do it bigger and better,” Lucia said.

However, the first change men’s hockey ticket holders will see is the switch to preferred seating. About 6,000 season ticket-holders will be required to make a $100, $200 or $300 donation per seat on top of the $755 base price. The University hopes to bring in at least $500,000 from the change.

“To use an analogy: I like my house, but we built a nice screened-in porch so we could enjoy the summers and not worry about mosquitoes, so it’s a nice addition,” Lucia said. “That’s the case with any upgrade in a facility — there’s things you want to be able to do to make it better.”

Fresh off of athletics director Joel Maturi’s retirement announcement, both Lucia and coach Tubby Smith have taken the opportunity to voice their agendas in hopes of re-prioritizing the new athletic director’s to-do list.

Smith said a new athletic director “will be critical” to fundraising for the men’s basketball practice facility that he has been lobbying for.

“We’ll keep pushing to get it done,” Smith said last Thursday. “We’ve had people traveling with us to almost every game looking at [practice] facilities. But I think we’re on the cusp on getting it done.”