Help our girls get a home

The St. Louis Lady Cyclones is the only all girls Ice Hockey Club in the region focusing exclusively on providing access to hockey for girls ages 4 through 19. We field teams in every age group, with multiple teams of various skill levels in many age groups. The club was founded in June 2002, offering a developmental/recreational program for girls of all ages. Even though we have almost two decades of successes, we do not currently have a home rink.

Girls Ice Hockey is the fastest growing segment of the sport in the St. Louis area. Nationally, the new female player participant rate for the 2016-2017 season grew 14.9%. Over the same period, our new player participant numbers increased by 64%! There are more girls playing hockey now than any other time in history, and the St. Louis Lady Cyclones are leading the way. This is just the tip of the iceberg, as we would love to open up playing opportunities to many more girls in the region. Unfortunately, limited resources in the area and rink closures have made the process much more difficult than it already was.

Many of the girls come to us as cast offs from boys teams. Some are told they’re “not good enough” to play with the boys; some are just ignored until they go away. Eventually, they find their way to the Lady Cyclones and find success, including the following accomplishments from the last year alone.

• Lady Cyclones 8U team finished 2nd in the New Year’s Day tournament against a field of all boys teams.
• Lady Cyclones 10U Cyclone team finished 1st in the St. Louis Arctic Blast Tournament.
• Lady Cyclones 12U team won the Rock-N-Roll Cup in Cleveland, Ohio.
• Lady Cyclones 19U team won both the Central Illinois March Meltdown Tournament and the Irish Cup in South Bend, Indiana.
• Four Lady Cyclones team members went on to compete at the Collegiate level.

Not bad for a group of girls that weren’t “good enough” to be on an all boys team!

Prior to 2016, the St. Louis Lady Cyclones had a home ice arrangement with a local ice rink. Operation of that rink changed right before the 2016 season, and all of our ice contracts cancelled, leaving us homeless. We have been nomadic since then, buying the leftover, unwanted ice times that the boys teams do not use. We currently operate out of a rental storage unit and find meeting spaces for coaches, parents and board members wherever they are available.

The Lady Cyclones have been presented with a once in a lifetime opportunity to be one of the founding tenants of the new St. Louis Community Ice Center. Opening in 2019, this facility will bring great things to St. Louis!
• FOUR sheets of ice (3 indoor and 1 outdoor rink)
• A medical center
• A skills and training building where our players can work on their shooting, skating and goaltending on synthetic ice.
• A permanent, state-of-the-art home for the St. Louis Lady Cyclones.

Despite the challenges we face, the future is bright. But we can't do it alone. We need help. The cost associated with becoming a tenant and having our own ice is a big obstacle. With the hockey and sports community behind us, we know we can get there. These girls deserve it, they deserve the chance to have a home ice rink that they’re proud of, they deserve female specific locker rooms, they deserve the chance to be equals to the boys clubs that dominate the region. Please donate if you can.

The St. Louis Lady Cyclones is an independent 501(c)(3) organization and solely funded by membership fees of its participants, revenues from fundraising and by generous support of corporate sponsors. All money raised will be used for funding the new ice project and furthering the growth of female Ice Hockey in the St. Louis region.