Pittsburgh is known to have a rich and proud history with The Steelers and their six Super Bowls and the Pirates with their five World Series Championships. However, the one thing I love the most about this city if the Hockey Team that we all know and love, The Pittsburgh Penguins. This is a team that I have supported since a young age through good times and through difficult times and it is a team that I shall continue to support for years to come. Every time I go to a game I could not stop and think about what happens behind the scenes of this great hockey team with the arena operations and as a aspiring journalist, through the media. That dream finally came true through Point Park as we got a private tour of the arena. Our tour guide was the Penguins Vice President of Communications Tom McMillian. He opened us up in open arms as the tour began. I got chills when I first stepped inside the arena because the last time I was there the Penguins were hoisting the Stanley Cup in Nashville.

We first went the lower stands where there were crew cleaning the arena so it will be ready for hockey in the fall and summer concerts as well. One of the interesting facts he told us was the roof was never finished during construction of the building, the architectures wanted to keep it like that to pay respects to the industrial history that the city possessed with the steel mills for over 100 years. Another interesting feature inside the building was the setup of the sections numbers. They were scratched behind the numbers to look like three rivers. As we continued Tom told us about why there is one part of building with glass windows. Since PNC Park and Heinz Field look toward the city, the designers thought the arena should do the same thing and with a reverse seeing if the city this time. A place to look at out the windows are where the old civic arena used to be. It is just dirt now and the designers didn’t want to put the new stadium on top of where the old arena used to be so fans especially season ticket holders can park in the same spot that they have always parked. Then Tom took us up to my personal favorite which was the press box. It was always a dream of mine to see where Mike Lange and Paul Steigerwald sit every night for the games and also all the reporters and writers. There was also a line of photos of the greatest moments in franchise history dating back to 1967. We then took the elevator down to the lower level where we got to walk through where the ice is. It wasn’t on the floor though because of cleaning but it was still a cool experience. Then we went into one of the sacred place in the building, Suite 66. It is a club with that people can sit at during the game while they can watch the Penguins come out of the locker room. The coolest feature inside it was all of Mario Lemieux’s accomplishments from his career. From all of his Trophies to game played sticks some of his great moments as a Pittsburgh Penguin are all featured in that suite. It was rather interesting how the trophies got there because there were cases with nothing in them and nobody could think of what to put in them. Mario then thought that he should put his trophies in there for a cool experience for the fans. so every personal NHL trophy won by him sits in those cases at the club in the bows of the arena. The tour of the arena was a very fascinating and unique experience and it is one I will remember for a long time.