Though plans have been hinted at for years now to demolish the thing, at present this fabled athletics shed still proudly stands. OSU’s men’s and women’s basketball teams both, as well as the men’s hockey squad, stopped playing here after the 97-98 campaigns, in favor of the Schottenstein Center up the road. Over the years, this multi-purpose venue has seen everything from a Rush concert in 1980, to presidential hopeful Barack Obama stumping here on the campaign trail. Of course, at least one active commander-in-chief has been here, too, when Gerald Ford delivered the university’s summer commencement address inside St. John Arena in 1974. I skated this ice back when they had a dedicated night of the week for public use of the rink, and watched my buddy Damon play hockey in these dim confines when he was a member of the Buckeye “B” squad, or whatever you call it. As recently as 2016 this arena avoided a very close scrape, when its proudly announced replacement was nixed, and it continues to find use for some of the less popular OSU indoor sports.
As pure chance would have it, I manage to catch the last ever hockey game the OSU men’s team played here, on Febuary 26, 1998. Damon’s ex-girlfriend Angie is in town this afternoon (all the more interesting in that Damon hasn’t gotten around to breaking up with his current girlfriend yet), and the three of us are hanging out at the house. While attending class, Damon heard something about this promotion they are running, and snapped up two tickets, before inviting Angie down: for a meager $5, students can catch this momentous event, which also includes an all-you-can-eat pizza dinner at the campus Tommy’s before the game. Upon learning that I’m off from work tonight and will be around, he’s hatching a plan to include me as well.
The three of us squeeze into his truck and drive across campus to the building where he bought these tickets. We reach some office on an upstairs floor, back near where Woody Hayes Drive crosses the Olentangy, and Damon’s speaking with the receptionist.
“I’m sorry, we’re all sold out. You might be able to buy some off the guy running it, though, he might still have a few tickets left on him….”
“What’s his name?” Damon asks.
“Eric.”
“And he’ll be there tonight?”
“Yes.”
“Okay,” Damon nods, “thanks.”
Undeterred, once we are outside the building again, he lays out a feasible backup plan. The chance of this Eric character having any tickets left is probably pretty slim. Nonetheless, Damon advises, what we’ll do is head into Tommy’s like nothing is awry, dive right into the free pizza and grab a seat. “And then if this Eric guy acts like he wants to see your ticket, tell him the secretary you talked to said he’d have one you could buy here.”
As it turns out, none of these machinations are necessary. Nobody is inspecting anything whatsoever at this restaurant. We help ourselves to reams of the gratis pizza, the free Pepsi to wash it down (or was it Coke? I feel like Bruce would surely know, off the top of his head, precisely what they serve here), and then Damon feels inspired to go buy a pitcher of beer and really ramp up the festivities a notch. Only when we are leaving, to walk across the street to the arena, does Eric ask for everyone’s ticket. When we reach him, I recite the spiel Damon had concocted.
“As it turns out, I do have one left,” he says. I hand him the five dollar bill, and he forks over the ticket.
Once everyone spills across Lane Avenue, flashing our proof of entry at the gate, the three of us snag some choice seats near ground level, right behind the visiting team’s net. Up the street, at the Olentangy River Road intersection, construction is nearly completed for what will be the new home for this as well as the basketball programs. If you want to get technical, though I and who knows what other high percentage of campus denizens aren’t aware of this, the hockey team plays at OSU Ice Rink. Yes, this is the name they actually use for the space where we currently find ourselves, a 1,400 seater on a separate wing of the same building, accessed via the same entrances. Everyone seems to refer to the entire building as St. John Arena, though, and you surely would too if driving past and pointing it out to your parents or something.
Now that we’re nearing the tail end of the 1997-98 campaign, the Buckeyes are finishing out an amazing season, with talks that winning state seems perfectly reasonable, and a Frozen Four title might even be in the cards. First, however, they must dispense with the Miami, Ohio squad, not exactly known as much of a powerhouse in anything except maybe illicit substance consumption.
But this will actually turn into a well fought contest. Miami is outplaying OSU in the early going, scoring first, in period one. The home team looks ragged and has virtually no offense, though somehow tying things up with about thirty seconds left in this period.
A seesaw battle develops from here, and though digging live hockey as much as the next guy, for some reason it’s a struggle keeping my eyes open during this one. It could be the afternoon beer or excessive work schedule or lack of sleep, and surely not because nobody scores at all during period no. 2, or most of the third one as well. In the closing moments, though, OSU fires the puck into Miami’s goal once more. As a desperation move the visitors pull their goalie, to give themselves a better shot at scoring, though the Buckeyes capitalize on this backfiring tactic and slap a third point on the board. Final tally is 3-1, with the good guys further cementing their status as impending tournament heavyweights.
Following some road contests, the season will end and they will advance as far as a semi-final game in the tournament bracket. Fittingly enough, this campaign proves the most successful in over 25 years, probably since the class of 1971-72.
Two nights later, the men’s basketball squad will play its final scheduled game here, across the hall in the actual St. John Arena. An overtime loss to Penn State drops them to 8-21 on the year, with an especially miserable 1-15 record to this point against the Big Ten (they have one road game remaining, against Indiana). The season actually began well, with a 7-3 mark, before this horrific 14 game losing streak within their own conference. A change of venues will do them good, however, for they experience a complete reversal in the following season, their first at the Schottenstein Center, when they reach the Final Four. Scheduling mixups at their new home leads them to return to St. John Arena for a single game during both the 2004 and 2008 seasons.
After a ten year break from the place, in November 2018, they again return to this old shed, in a promotional gimmick which sells more tickets than the average game at Value City Arena does. How is this for irony? In the straight up sad department, however, I seriously spent well over an hour online trying to find the date for the final women’s basketball game here. OSU’s website doesn’t have it and neither does the NCAAW’s. If anyone can locate this information, by all means hit me up.
