Thunderbirds christen new home in Kent on Saturday

KENT — When new owners purchased the Seattle Thunderbirds in 2002 there was one very big prerequisite for the team to be successful:

Move out of KeyArena and into a more suitable place in Western Washington for the team to play its games.

The makeshift, bumpy ice surface, inconsistent boards and constantly breaking glass at KeyArena were the least of the problems the team faced in its 13-plus years there.

In addition to high downtown rent, limited parking meant team officials routinely started games up to 15 minutes late to accommodate late-arriving fans. Those who showed up were swallowed up in cavernous KeyArena, even with the upper bowl closed.

Colin Campbell, a member of the group that purchased the team from former owner Bill Yuill so Yuill could buy an expansion franchise in Everett, was in charge of finding a suitable place to play.

In 2006 the team found a partner in the city of Kent. The result is the $84.5 million ShoWare Center, and the T-birds will play their first game there in front of a sold-out crowd of 6,133 tonight against the Everett Silvertips.

"KeyArena was never a good environment for watching our games, and we hit a home run with the city of Kent," Campbell said. "We were able to have an influence from the very beginning on things that are important for a hockey event. It's a great facility for us and other events."

Campbell, a former Zamboni driver for the Edmonton Oilers, has been with the T-birds for 16 years and is the team's vice president and assistant general manager to GM Russ Farwell. Campbell oversees all business aspects of the operation.

He said several factors make the ShoWare Center unique.

"There will really be a sense of intimacy, and it's very inviting because of the steep architecture of the bowl," Campbell said.

"There's not a bad seat in the building to see the action. The scoreboard and replay capabilities are something you would expect in a much bigger building."

The team kept 95 percent of its 1,000 season-ticket holders and has already doubled that base to more than 2,000. Campbell expects it to be 3,000 by season's end.

"The economic problems hit at a bad time, but we feel like we're in a position to draw well because the tickets are family affordable," Campbell said.

Tickets range in price from $16 to $40, with most premium seats $22.

Playing a road-heavy schedule while the ShoWare Center was under construction, the T-birds enter tonight's opener with a 15-20-1-2 record but with 25 of their final 34 games at home.

"We never had a home-ice advantage at KeyArena because no matter how passionate the fans were, it was in a half-empty building," Campbell said. "The noise level at the ShoWare Center is going to be tremendous, and the team should be able to feed off that energy."

The T-birds hope to partner with the Silvertips and Comcast Arena in Everett to draw major hockey tournaments.

"The two facilities should complement each other," Campbell said. "Not only for hockey but for other major events as well."

A high-school basketball tournament featuring the Kentlake, Kentridge, Kentwood and Kent-Meridian boys and girls teams is scheduled Jan. 30. The Harlem Globetrotters will be there on Feb. 18.