Take one step inside the Carrier Dome this week and you can tell there’s something different.

It’s warmer than the 20- and 30-degree temperatures that have become commonplace in Syracuse this week, but it isn’t exactly a respite from what’s outside, either.

Rather, it has the feel of a hockey arena. Cold enough for a jacket, but warm enough where you’re still relatively comfortable. In place of the iconic Syracuse basketball court, you’ll see a sight that has never been seen before in the building’s 34-year history — an NHL-sized hockey rink.

In the Frozen Dome Classic, Syracuse’s men’s ice hockey club team will play West Virginia on Friday at 9 p.m. after a high school matchup. The Syracuse Crunch plays Utica at 7 p.m. on Saturday after Oswego State takes on Utica College.

Six days ago, none of this existed. The basketball court was intact, waiting for the men’s and women’s basketball teams to play a pair of Sunday afternoon games. But once that ended, the Dome wasn’t going to sleep.

A group of workers from the Crunch, Carrier Dome and ice companies, among others, have been the drivers behind this mega-project. A vapor barrier was laid down before plywood, then to piping before the ice-making process got underway.

“When you look back at this event, the two greatest challenges we have: one is to sell 28,183 tickets,” said Jim Sarosy, the Crunch’s chief operating officer, referencing the U.S. professional hockey indoor attendance record. “And No. 2, from doing it is that where you have to two weeks, whatever you need, 10 days, whatever crew it is, we have three days to get this up (before the team practices).”

The Crunch surpassed the record for ticket sales Thursday and still has a number of tickets for sale, the team said. Tickets are available all the way out to sections 321 and 335, according to Ticketmaster.

Sarosy said Tuesday night was a period when a lot of people who are heavily involved could take a rest before dedicating 20-22 hour days for the rest of the week.

“A lot of it now is you really can’t leave because if something does blow, even that time it takes to get from home to here could be disastrous to the event,” Sarosy said.

Sarosy added that building the ice is a different animal compared to taking care of a baseball field or a turf football field. The ice at the Dome has to be between 2.5 to 3 inches because of its build and freshness, compared to the thickness of an inch and a quarter at the Crunch’s home at the War Memorial.

However, weather hasn’t been an issue the way it could be for an outdoor game, though the Dome’s roof still lets sunlight inside.

“The biggest thing is you don’t have to worry about rain or snow,” Sarosy said.

That wasn’t the case in 2010 when the Crunch hosted the first outdoor AHL game in the league’s history at the New York State Fairgrounds. Sarosy said the team learned a lot from that experience and had an idea about what to expect when it came to making Saturday’s game happen.

“We’ve really drawn on our experience from the outdoor game in 2010 and a lot of what went into that is the same here,” he said. “It’s just that kind of in fast forward in terms of how quick everything has to get done.”

Ice Rink Events workers and Jim Hartnett, an ice consultant who was involved in 2010, among others, work with SU senior athletic director for facilities Pete Sala, his team and the Crunch staffers.

“Outside we have to dance with Mother Nature,” Hartnett said. “In here it’s been the time constraint.”

Hartnett said he’s been working on the smaller details like setting up dasher boards and penalty boxes as the ice continues to solidify.

Sarosy characterized the process as a system of compromises using the example of installing glass while you’re painting the ice — two things that don’t usually happen at the same time but need to occur simultaneously on this deadline.

“A lot of these people are used to working at their craft in a set way in a certain amount of time and we’ll have three or four things going on,” he said.

Sarosy gave a lot of credit to Sala for putting the Crunch in a position to succeed.

“Everything we need, it seems like it’s right at our disposal or right at his disposal,” Sarosy said. “It’s not just the labor; it’s the knowledge of what they’ve done and what they do here.”

Published on November 21, 2014 at 1:36 pm