New management, new team, new life

An anachronism no longer, the New Haven Coliseum renovates its bathrooms and its image.

Hockey has a long history in New Haven—a long history of failure.

But the New Haven Knights, who play their first game tonight against the Mohawk Valley Predators, are here to tell you this time is different. This team—an expansion franchise of the United Hockey League (UHL), an independent minor league—won't get sold to Ottawa like the Senators did in 1993. This team won't last just two years and then fold, like the Beast did last year.

"There are three ingredients to a successful minor-league sports team," Knights majority owner Eric Margenau said. Margenau, a former sports psychologist, ought to know—his company, United Sports Ventures, currently owns seven minor-league baseball and hockey teams and has bought and sold several others. In the 1980s, he and his former partner sold two baseball teams for a profit of over $3.5 million. You might say he knows how to make teams succeed. Margenau's recipe: Take a large, diverse market. Add an attractive arena, stir in quality management, and watch it rise.

New Haven has always had the population and the venue to make hockey work, but the third ingredient—the arena management—is the one you really taste. Scores of would-be Beast fans were driven away by dirty bathrooms with ancient fixtures, unhelpful staff, inconvenient concessions, and poor lighting. But now the New Haven Veterans Memorial Coliseum, the hulking monolith on State Street, is under new management. Since it was built 28 years ago, the city of New Haven has managed the Coliseum. City governments know how to do a lot of things; managing an arena isn't one of them. But it's SMG Marketing Group's specialty. SMG is the largest private manager of public venues in the world by far—it manages about 160 venues around the world. Its next largest competitor handles about 10.

"Since SMG has come into the building, we have a much higher comfort level," Margenau said. "We know the arena will be managed at a professional level, that they'll put the money into it to fix it up, enhance the amenities, and make it appealing to fans."

The difference is apparent as soon as you walk in. Where once there were blank, dark walls and a confusing array of different-colored signs, now there are sparkling surfaces illuminated by bright overhead lights. Blue and turquoise triangular banners, interspersed with yellow shooting stars hang from the ceiling. Brightly painted souvenir and concessions stands greet you at the entrance rather than hiding in corners. The bathrooms are fully renovated; they even have automatic toilets.

If Margenau is right, these improvements will make all the difference. And if the Knights succeed, SMG hopes the Coliseum will host not just hockey, but also basketball, arena football, and possibly lacrosse or indoor soccer. From `Giga who?' to gigawatt When John Burnap formally took over as general manager of the Coliseum last December, he was astonished. A New Canaan native and a University of New Haven graduate, his experience includes producing road shows for Nickelodeon and events at New York's Madison Square Garden. "The [Coliseum's] phone system was state-of-the-art 16 years ago," he said. When Burnap arrived, "There were lost calls and lost messages all over the place, or it would just stop working. That's our lifeline! That's how people get information! That's how people get tickets!"

Burnap is an excitable man, but the Coliseum's state was truly shocking. The building's wiring was hopelessly antiquated—now it has been totally redone. In the whole building there were two computers, a 486 and a 386; now the team has a website, www.newhavenknights.com. There was no sign anywhere on the structure identifying it as the Coliseum; soon it will have an electronic marquee to announce coming events. The escalators from the parking garage to the seats never worked, and since they were exposed to the elements, they became a favorite roost (and toilet) for pigeons—now, after paying a pigeon abatement consultant $75,000, the birds can't perch there anymore. Bathrooms were disgusting, workers were surly, and at no single concession stand could a customer purchase both a beer and a hot dog. With restroom renovations, new training programs, and new concession stands, those problems are a thing of the past.

MOLLY BALL/YH New Coliseum General Manager John Burnap is king of the concession stand.

"This isn't rocket science! This is common sense!" Burnap exclaimed. SMG hopes to stage about 160 events in the 2000-01 season, compared to 95 in 1999-2000. These will include Knights games, music concerts, and the Yale-Notre Dame hockey game, which will bring Yale back to the Coliseum for the first time in 10 years.

Burnap remembers what it was like to grow up here and look forward to Coliseum events—he saw his first concert, Bob Dylan, at the Coliseum. "At that time, it was the entertainment facility in the area," he said. "There's no reason it can't once again be a stellar guest experience."

Everyone's a believer. "It's about the perception you give the fans," Knights General Manager Chris Presson said. "If they come to one game, I know they'll come back. That hasn't necessarily been the case in the past." Presson started the Topeka Scarecrows of the Central Hockey League from scratch, and he's eager to start a team again.

"People don't understand what `expansion team' means," Presson said. "It's like starting a new business. No team colors, no coach, no staff, no players, no computers, no phone lines—you're literally starting from the ground up." Now the Knights have all those things. They even have a mascot: Nick the Knight, a rollerblading chevalier who wears silver foam-pad "armor" and a maniacal grin. All they need is an audience. Follow the leader If Burnap has his way, a minor-league basketball team will call the Coliseum home as soon as the 2001-02 season. It almost happened this year: "We were a day and a half from calling a press conference in mid-August," Burnap said. "The deal was done, we were ready to rock and roll." The Continental Basketball Association (CBA) had agreed to move Hartford's Connecticut Pride to New Haven.

But the NBA had decided that Thomas couldn't coach a team and own a minor league franchise. He tried to find a buyer for the CBA, but couldn't; the league was put in the hands of a group of trustees until a permanent owner could be found. And the trustees didn't want to make any decisions—like moving a team—that might unsettle a potential buyer. "They couldn't decide to move, so they decided to stay," Burnap said.

In its current arena, the 3,500-seat Hartford Armory, the Pride leads the league in road attendance—and comes in last in home attendance, despite being the 1998-99 league champions. "Their facility is dragging them down," Burnap said; it's an awkward structure, a former National Guard armory, in an out-of-the-way part of town that's not particularly safe. In the Coliseum, Burnap believes the team could live up to its potential.

MOLLY BALL/YH Bulldog defenseman turned New Haven Knight, Keith Fitzpatrick, TD '00.

He also believes New Haven could support an arena football team. SMG is working with the AF2, the 22-team minor league created last year by the Arena Football League, to create a six-team Northeast Division of expansion teams. One of these would be in New Haven. The AF2 must still approve the plan, but Burnap says a New Haven arena football team is likely to open in April 2002.

More teams means more opportunities for cross-marketing, an idea Burnap has already implemented with Sports Pass. For $100, you get four tickets to a New Haven Ravens baseball game, the Pilot Pen Tennis Tournament, a Yale football game, and Knights opening weekend—including parking, hot dogs, sodas, and programs.

In the next couple of years, Burnap plans to stage one-time events to evaluate the possibility of bringing indoor lacrosse and soccer teams to the Coliseum as well. Hometown boyz So what will the Knights look like on the ice? "The team looks outstanding," Assistant Coach Scott Bell said. "We should be pretty competitive." Bell said the team's strength will be its defense, especially the strong goaltending of Blair Allison and Brice Wandler.

Defenseman Keith Fitzpatrick, TD '00, can't wait to get started. After graduating in May, the Long Island native looked for a place to play and considered a team in Roanoke, Va., before settling on the Knights. "It's a pretty easy decision when the team is right here in town," said Fitzpatrick, an Economics major who works at a local law firm between practices. He might eventually go to law school, but for now, he couldn't be happier. He lives in a beach house in Milford with three of his Knights teammates. "The team is definitely a step up—it's much better than the Yale team. The guys are older, some of them have played in the NHL. It's a different atmosphere."

As far as Burnap is concerned, if the team starts to win, that's just icing on the cake. "Eighty percent of the audience at a minor-league sporting event doesn't go because they're a hockey fan, or a baseball fan, or a basketball fan," he said. "They're there just to see a game—an evening of sports entertainment with their friends or family." Burnap looks forward to bringing his two sons, ages nine and 11, and his five-year-old daughter to the Coliseum he has created. "It's about quality time—sharing excitement, creating memories. It's just like going to the movies."

Photo of Nick the Knight by Molly Ball.

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