Target USA Cup Ready for Nature’s Worst

By Tim McNiff 

When it comes to the Target USA Cup the planning never really ends. At the same time, the folks at host site National Sports Center know that some things that will always be out of their control. A fact not lost on Tournament Director Jen Een. 

“Yesterday it looked like it was going to be 90 and we were going to be dealing with heat-related issues. This morning, I looked at it when I woke up and I was like, oh no, we might be pivoting here to some rain and inclement weather.” 

On day two of the Target USA Weekend Tournament, unexpected rain rolled through in the AM, throwing the tournament staff into adjustment mode. 

“Weather days are challenging”, says Een. “However, we’ve been doing it a long time so I think we have a really good plan in place so, we’re pretty good about navigating those days.” 

On this day, Team Target USA Cup needed to be on top of their game as mother nature not only returned in the afternoon, this time she brough an added dose of lightning. 

“Play is stopped because there is lightning within a 10-mile radius of the National Sports Center. When the horns blow, we want you off the fields and taking shelter”, says Sara Soli, Chief Marketing and communications Officer at the National Sports Center. “We’ve made a commitment to communicate every fifteen minutes on social media. We’re not going to give you estimations on when play is going to resume because we don’t know. We’re not meteorologists and often times they’re not right, either. So, we will do our best to keep you updated, we try to be efficient in our communication and give you the information you need to know.” 

That information is far from guesswork. The National Sports Center has invested in a top-notch prediction system that’s employed by the U.S. military that leaves little to nothing to chance.  

Says Soli, “We use Thor Guard (Integrated Lightning and Warning Systems) to monitor the lightning risk, we use it to monitor heat, so, we’re using a scientific tool to help us make the best decisions possible so it’s not left up to just one individual. That reassures me that we will make the right decisions, and from a communications process we have an internal line of communication where we’re all alerted when games need to be halted so that goes around the entire tournament to make sure that the people who have to know, know. 

When the weather horns go off thousands of people suddenly need a place to shelter, and Target USA Cup is prepared for that, too. 

“Fortunately, we do have buildings on site”, says Een. “We have the Welcome Center, we have the Expo, which has the store and fun things to do when people have to get out of the rain. We also have the Super Rink, which has the Hat Trick (Café) and maybe there’s some hockey going on that people can watch. So, there are places for people to go.” 

By the time the weather has moved on the tournament organizers have met, consulted their own five-and-a-half page weather playbook, and made a custom plan to resume play based on multiple factors. 

“We have to assess the fields, how much daylight we have, we have to assess how many games we have left”, says Een. “We also have to look at the referees and we can’t just move things around because we also have to make sure we have referees on the field so we have a lot of different things to think about when we are making changes and planning for the rest of the day.” 

The patrons enduring the weather delay aren’t shy about offering their thoughts on the delay. Soli says that comes with the territory, but at the end of the day The Target USA Cup will never move away from safety first. 

“Some people are never going to be satisfied and others are going to be completely understanding when you are managing fifty games at one time and trying to communicate to over a hundred teams. You know, you’re never going to be perfect, but I feel like we have a really good process.” 

A process created over years of experience enduring many weather delays. A process that doesn’t involve hoping for the best but rather making sure that you learn from the worst.  

Says Een, “Of course we want to play the games. Of course, we want people to have fun, but we HAVE to make sure that everyone is safe, that is our number one priority. After that, we will do our best to make sure that you get as much play as you can and that you have fun. After the weather has passed.”