Ice Castle

Friday night teen skates, with a D.J., are a flat $ 10. That includes skate rental and admission.
Food and drinks are extra, and not cheap. A (small) plain slice is $ 3, and believe me, it’s nothing like Joe and Pie’s quality.
Still, the teens have fun, and $ ¹⁰⁄₃ hours of peace and quiet is a bargain. Me? I’ve got this down pat: 2 laundry loads, 2 dish loads (by hand), vacuum 2 rooms and 2 halls, disinfect kitchen floor, feet up, glass of wine, and a fresh puece of melon. #PetitePowerhouse

Nice facility but they don’t turn on the overhead heat bars in the rink. Very cold to watch a game in even buy usual local rink standards.

Attended a youth hockey tournament. The facilities seem nice, two sheets of ice, nice bleachers. My biggest complaint is the reliability of the free WiFi. Having a dumb phone and my tablet I wanted to be able to surf and post before, during and after the games. Unfortunately most of the time the WiFi was down. There is a lot of downtime especially before games where having working WiFi was be great.

Disclaimer: this review is from the perspective of a parent of a youth amateur hockey player.
Ice Castle is a nice arena, possibly the nicest in the South Hills. There are two sheets of ice with ample spectator seating with a clear, unobstructed view of the ice. The rinks are very well lit, and very well maintained. The bleachers are wood which is not as cold as aluminum, and not noisy like aluminum. (This is important because young kids love to run on the bleachers that are aluminum because of the noise they can make.) There is also viewing from outside the rink on a balcony with tables and chairs accessible from the lobby. The lobby is also large, and includes a large projection TV and smaller LCD TV’s that usually play the important professional sports games going on. They have a newly renovated pro shop which is always important to have at a hockey rink. They have a fantastic snack bar with a short order grill where breakfast is served all day. And fresh coffee! The parking out front is ample, and there is more on the side of the building. These amenities make Ice Castle and ideal rink for weekend tournaments.
So why doesn’t this rink warrant a 5 star rating? Well, another offering in the lobby is a bar. Tournament parents too often pass time in the bar drinking beer, watching sports and socializing with other tournament parents between games. When they later watch their kid’s next game, they have a tendency to start heckling the kids on the opposing team, which often brings on a response from those kids’ parents and it just goes down from there.
Nevertheless this is a very good rink for ice hockey, and a fantastic venue for hockey tournaments.

I thought this place was cool.
Get it? … ok, anyway as far as ice rinks go I thought it was just fine.
I was here for a hockey tournament and not some annoying kids theme birthday party with clowns and shit. My greatest concern is not the qualiy of pizza in the snack bar but if the can has toilet paper and working johns by day #2 of the tournament. I’m just glad to walk through the parking lot and not step on broken beer bottles. Which begs the question… why do soccer moms feel they have to compete to have the best birthday party gig for their kids? Seriously, you are probably flirting with a law suit scenerio when you hold a party at a place that almost guarantees injury. I know… you always feel obligated to invite the kid that has a.d.d. issues or is on 18 different medications and has to be pushed around in an iron lung. Your choice I guess… but when little Malachi gets wigged out on Mountian Dew and bounces his coconut face first on the ice knocking his front teeth out… I’ll say I told you so.
Anyway…the ice was fine, the facility was extremely clean (all weekend) and bonus… the coat hooks are high on the wall in the locker room (this puts your jacket higher than your head when you sit on the bench).
Bottom line: Party time? Keep Dewey Cheatum and Howe on speed dial, mom.

Had my sons birthday party here and honestly wasn’t impressed. Observed two employees have a verbal argument. The pizza was worse than one U would get in the frozen section at your supermarket. They did not have anything to assist new skaters such as buckets or walkers. If given the chance again I wouldn’t have another party here. Prices are way to high for what u get.
On a positive note the birthday cake was very good. Very pleasantly surprised by this.