The Rink of Dreams: United Heroes League Teams Up with HTG

There’s nothing quite like an outdoor hockey rink.

Just ask Shane Hudella, a goalie, former active member of the Minnesota Army National Guard and retired First Sergeant, founder and CEO of United Heroes League (UHL), a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization.

In 2009, Hudella joined former Minnesota Wild players Brent Burns and Derek Boogaard to form UHL (formerly Defending the Blue Line) with a focus on supporting military families. To date, the UHL has provided more than $12 million worth of free sports equipment, tickets, cash grants, experiences and more.

Now, with help from HTG Architects, his vision of a sports complex for military families is expanding. We caught up with Hudella for an update on the “Rink of Dreams” and much more.

HTG: For those who might not know, give us a snapshot of the UHL.

Shane Hudella: We've been around for almost 15 years now. The United Heroes League helps military kids and families with the high cost of sports. We provide everything that they need so that the kids can play the game they love. We provide free equipment for 14 different sports now. We do grants to help with registration fees and sports fees. We do a number of youth sports camps – we've got one coming up with the Vikings here in early November – and we do ticketing to pro sports all over the country.

We do all of this to military families just as a thank you for their service and we're really the only ones in America that are doing this mission. So we've got a lot of demand and are always welcoming new supporters. If people want to get involved, they can visit us at www.giveuhl.org.

HTG: What made HTG the partner of choice for such an exciting project?

Hudella: We've been so fortunate to have HTG involved for a number of years now. They actually helped us design our Heroes Monument that's on our property adjacent to the rink. That was a couple of years ago. We brought that to life during COVID.

We're just so impressed by their work, and ice rinks are what they do, so when we got to the next stage of our development on our Veterans Campus, it just made sense to bring them back in to do all the architecture on the outdoor refrigerated rink that we're building.

HTG: But this is going to be more than just an outdoor rink, right? Easy decision though to start with hockey in the State of Hockey?

Hudella: It is. We're super excited with what we’re trying to do, and that’s building the nation's first sports complex for military kids and families. Just our heritage and roots, initially Defending the Blue Line, and now United Heroes League, it made sense that our first big sports component would be an outdoor refrigerated rink.

HTG: This vision has been a long time coming. Take us back to the origins when you purchased the land in Hastings, Minnesota in 2016.

Hudella: We cut the ribbon on the monument for the complex last November, but before that, we built our military obstacle course in 2020. That's kind of tucked away in the woods and that's super cool. We have high school sports teams here all the time putting their teams through our military obstacle course, and then we've had the Wild, police, fire, military and some other corporate groups as well.

So that was 2020. In 2021, we broke ground on the monument which we finished and opened last year in 2022. And then this spring, boy, the landscape changed dramatically. We put in a giant Walmart-sized parking lot and got to work on the rink.

HTG: What are some exciting things on the horizon for this rink and beyond?

Hudella: We're going to be announcing this next week, but a Veterans Day jamboree and grand opening at United Heroes League. The rink is going to be called Scheels Rink at United Heroes League, a part of the Tradition Veterans Complex.

We'll have a couple of days filled with veteran hockey games and a kids clinic that will have some pro hockey players helping out.

And then, the cool thing about our campus and the whole project, we can share these assets with the community. So Hastings youth hockey will be playing games at different levels out here on Veterans Day as well.

We were hoping to have the campus done sometime in 2027. And it does depend on donations and capital campaign financing, and all those good things we hope to see next year.

We should have a building next to the rink that will have locker rooms and the Zamboni garage. For this winter, we're going to operate out of warming tents. Next year there will be a building next to the rink with concessions and locker rooms, the Zamboni garage and a viewing area.

And then, in 2025, a football field and a soccer field. The summer of 2026 we will break ground on an 80,000-square foot facility that will have an indoor rink, a basketball court, turf field, batting cages, a bigger warehouse to service military families with our equipment program, office space, and all kinds of good things.

We are just so excited to have this offering for our families and our community. We can’t wait to see it come together.