HERITAGE MINUTE

The Air Force Academy’s cavernous Cadet Field House contains facilities for intercollegiate basketball, hockey, and track & field, among other sports and events. Sometimes IT'S mistakenly called Clune Arena.----more----

The Field House has not yet been named for any individual. The building, which contains more than 217,000-square feet of usable space, is actually three separate athletic venues under one very large, very flat roof. One of the three venues is Clune Arena, the area primarily used for basketball. Sharing space with Clune are the Cadet Ice Rink and the all-purpose area that is mostly utilized for track & field events and training. The Field House did not come online until nearly a decade after the first USAFA cadets graduated. On April twenty-second, 1968, with construction complete, the final acceptance and transfer of the Field House occurred. Five days later, Academy-assigned personnel and their dependents participated in a special “Preview Showing” of the Field House. The Academy basketball and hockey teams first began competing in the Field House in the fall of 1968. Among the countless track-and-field stars to excel in the building are Olympic marathon gold medalist Frank Shorter and our own Olympic gold medalist, Alonzo Babers, Class of ’83. The five-decade-old structure is currently undergoing a massive multi-year renovation.

The Heritage Minute Channel is a production of the Long Blue Line Podcast Network and presented by the U.S. Air Force Academy Association and Foundation