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Sudbury Wolves Arena Name: Walden Community Centre |
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| Walden Community Centre |
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| What was the Arena Like? |
| Walden Community Centre is a small arena in the Greater Sudbury community of Lively, Ontario that was a temporary and occasional host to the Sudbury Wolves in the early 1980s. In the early 1980's the Wolves reached a nadir not only in their franchise history, but quite possibly in junior hockey history. Between 1980 and 1990 under the ownership of Joe "Ivan" Drago, the Wolves made the playoffs only once - in 1986, when they were swept in the first round by the eventual Memorial Cup champion Guelph Platers. Attendance, predictably, dropped. For mid-week games and others not expected to draw more than a couple hundred fans, the Wolves decided to save money by booking into the smaller, cheaper Walden Community Centre instead of Sudbury Arena. The rink itself is a smallish building of light brown brick and sky blue aluminum siding, with the unmistakable arched ceiling that indicates a hockey arena. It's located right on the south side of town within spitting distance of the Trans-Canada Highway. Once inside, the lobby of the building is done up in a tasteful dark green, with the cold seating area behind a set of glassed-in doors. The ice surface itself is surrounded by a few rows of seats running down each sideline. The seats themselves are grey wooden benches. It's difficult to really write a great deal about the Walden Community Centre. Its presence on this website is a memorial to the colossal mismanagement of an OHL team to the point that they thought it was better to book into a junior B rink than a nice, full-sized one because they weren't going to draw enough to sell out the tiny rink anyway. The real miracle in the story is that the Wolves are still in Sudbury - and hey, a team that can survive playing in a place like Walden deserves all the kudos it can get. |
How To Get There |
| From the Trans-Canada Highway (17): Exit at Road 55 and proceed west a short distance, before making a right on Main Street into Lively. After crossing back under the TCH, turn left on Anderson Drive. The arena will be on your left. |
| Inside the Walden Community Centre |
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What's It Used For Today? |
| Walden Community Centre was only a temporary footnote in OHL history, used because the terrible, terrible Wolves couldn't sell out Sudbury Arena in the 1980s. It is still used as a community rink for the town of Lively, and was renamed the Tom Davies Community Centre in honour of the former Regional Chairman (read: Mayor) of Greater Sudbury in 2004. |
Feedback |
If anything is incorrect or you have something to add, please e-mail me at  and I'll update the guide. |
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Copyright © Kevin Jordan
2002-07. |