Now dubbed the “Lakota West Champions Center,” the converted space also features a weight training center along one side that will relieve tight space in the school’s main weight room, said Lakota West Athletic Director Scott Kaufman.
“We’ve always had a goal of doing an indoor facility,” said the veteran AD, “but I realized we weren’t going to raise $8 or $9 million to build a (separate) building..
“So, we started looking at our existing facilities and what is being under-utilized and what we could adjust to use, and this facility is too low of a ceiling for volleyball and too short of court for basketball.
A discussion with Lakota West boys and girls coaches led to pursuing private athletic booster funds “to make this a more effective training area,” he said.
“Every coach was on board, and we will be able to use this in every sport, every day of the year in a better way than an old rubber floor with a low ceiling could ever do,” he said.
The synthetic turf cost covered by athletic boosters came in under budget at less than the $65,000 Kaufman had projected.
All Lakota West students — regardless of whether they play school sports — will also have access to the new Champions Center.
“It also creates a space for phys ed and now when it rains, they can do some indoor soccer or field hockey without scratching up the (main) wooden gym floor. And this is a better surface than the old, hard rubber surface,” he said. “You can do a 40-yard dash in here, and students can do conditioning.”
And when classes start later this month, it will help relieve sometimes-crowded conditions in the main weight room, where at times 60 to 70 students were at top capacity. Now about 100 can weight train at once with the additional option of weight stations along one wall of the Champions Center.
Betsy Fuller, spokeswoman for Lakota Schools, said the revamped facility “is a great example of how our schools and district partner with our parent support organizations to make an idea come to life in a fiscally responsible way.”
“We are grateful for the support of the Lakota West Athletic Boosters and look forward to seeing our student athletes using this new space,” said Fuller.
Lakota East High School in Liberty Twp. also considered a similar move in its building, which is nearly identical.
But Fuller said East’s Athletic Director, Jill Meiring, discussed the project with Kaufman and she had also taken the idea to her coaches “to get their input.”
“They’ve decided to go a different direction with their upper gym,” said Fuller.
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