March 22, 2026
Meridian Centre (Capacity: 5,300)
St. Catharines, ON
Niagara IceDogs vs Erie Otters
Final Score: 6 – 5 (OT)
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The second part of this weekend trip brought me back to the OHL, where it has been nine years since my last visit to the league. While driving back from a Detroit Red Wings game, we went through Canada’s Golden Horseshoe and a convenient stop before going back to New York was an afternoon game in the Niagara Peninsula. Although the IceDogs make Niagara their first name for a number of sensical reasons, it’s not near the Falls, but rather they are located in St. Catharines. This Southern Ontario city of 136,000 people is the country’s 42nd largest and features a manufacturing background. The downtown has been revitalized and a big part of that was the arrival of the Meridian Centre in 2014. Playing initially in an older arena, the Niagara IceDogs arrived from Mississauga in 2007, retaining the Don Cherry-inspired logo from the original tenure. The team has made the OHL playoff finals twice (losing to London both times). Recent years haven’t been great as they’ve been marred by rule-breaking, scandals, misconduct and losing seasons. While their troublesome owner Darren DeDobbelaer is still there, the season I visited saw the IceDogs better on the ice and looking for their first playoff series win in 7 years. As for the Meridian Centre experience…it’s a decent rink and worth a trip to visit.
Prestige Ranking: 3 out of 5
Location
A good place to start when coming to The Garden City is the St. Catharines Museum & Welland Canal Centre. Sitting right on the historic shipping canal that connects Lake Erie with Lake Ontario, this free museum not only provides a great overview of the city, it also gives the opportunity to see a large ship traverse the nearby lock. The museum is a 12-minute ride from downtown…the same distance as the shores of Lake Ontario to the north if you want to stop by Lakeside Park for the small beach, carousel and pier. As for downtown, St. Paul Street is the heart of it. This curvy road features an impressive number of bars and restaurants all housed in seemingly endless adjoining city buildings. The landscape is unique because there is an elevation drop-off and the Meridian Centre is behind and below that downtown core. To connect it seamlessly, there are a pair of walkways that lead from St. Paul Street to the 5th floor of the arena. It’s a unique visual and entrance. Venturing out of St. Catharines, you are only 20 minutes from Niagara Falls and their breathtaking natural wonders. Also nearby are plenty of wineries, especially enticing if you come to a game during the Fall months (remember the OHL season starts in September).
Location Ranking: 8 out of 10
Accessibility / Parking
St. Catharines is just 20 minutes from the Lewiston Bridge or Rainbow Bridge, making it the quickest stop for New Yorkers looking to come over for some Canadian junior hockey at the highest level. The QEW goes through the city as the highway essentially rounds the Lake, going from Toronto to Niagara. Traffic isn’t nearly as bad in this area as it can be when you get to Hamilton-Toronto, but you still may run into slow-downs around here. Exit 44 from the QEW leads to Highway 77 and it’s just a few minutes until you are downtown. If coming from the west, you’ll probably get off at Highway 406. Two garages within a 4-6 minute walk of the Meridian Centre make up for the lack of on-site parking. Don’t be fooled by the arena lots as apparently you need a “Government-Issued Permit”, according to the website. We opted for the Carlisle Street Garage so we could walk St. Paul Street to the game. Getting out after the game traffic-wise wasn’t bad despite the narrow city streets.
Accessibility / Parking Ranking: 7 out of 8
Exterior
A few shades of gray make up the flat metal walls of the arena, however there are multiple sections that are brick. Maybe they did this to have it fit with the city architecture. That probably wasn’t necessary since there is such a separation between the two and you can’t even see the arena being so far down the hill. Plus, the combo makes for an odd visual. Outside of that, the shaping and overall design is decent.
Exterior Ranking: 6 out of 10
Concourse
The bi-lateral arrival of fans converge via staircases to the third level for the main arena. The box office is located on Level 1 and there’s not a lot of space. I found myself scrambling as to looking where I am / going, then having security tell me I couldn’t bring my camera in (they thankfully acquiesced). The large footprint of the arena was no matter for interior space as I was disappointed to see the concourse only made up of open space behind the seating bowl. Along the sides, it became remarkably tight and that was exacerbated by concession stand lines on one side and protruding seats back further than they needed to be on the other. Walking through between intermission was terrible. At the ends, there is more to roam, though only one end can be dubbed spacious. Signage, displays and color scheme did add character, even if the colors didn’t match those of the IceDogs.
Concourse Ranking: 2 out of 5
Food
Menu items are fairly standard arena food with at least all of the expected stadium food groups in there. Poutine of course can be found and it looked pretty good. The IceDogs offer a couple items featured for a specific game and that lone uniqueness made for a decent lunch. The Montreal Smoked Meat Sandwich hit the spot for me. Filling and good quality. Some local breweries were featured, like Niagara’s Oast House, plus there was a great assortment of alcohol that was more than just beer.
Food Ranking: 5 out of 8
Interior
The oval seating bowl has good sightlines as the pitch between rows is adequate. The narrow stairs are a little awkward, along with the block up at the end of each row. Otherwise, the height was good enough. There are enough rows (13-16) to get a wider view, they just don’t need to go as far back and intrude on the concourse. Chairs are blue with no issues for overall space. This is a fairly standard set-up and suites can be found hanging over a few back rows of the seating bowl on the sides. A club lounge and seating is above one upper end, while tables and chairs open to anyone is at the other end. Building colors are fairly neutral as there isn’t much that makes you think “IceDogs”.
Interior Ranking: 8.5 out of 14
Scoreboard
It is a very plain looking scoreboard above center ice and while the video quality can be fine, the in-house camera provides a terrible picture. Game action and replays just didn’t have a good look as the almost pixelated visual was not useful. Otherwise, basic game info was in a square at the top.
Scoreboard Ranking: 2 out of 4
Displays
A corner of the concourse is dedicated to the city’s sports Hall of Fame. Nothing exuberant, just a name and year of honor. The rest of the area features display cases solely devoted to lacrosse. It’s a cool walk-through, but just somewhat out-of-place, especially given that there is nothing for the IceDogs. The lone display in the concourse for them is a team picture above the condiments table. Banners at least do hang from the rafters and they honor team Division and Conference championships. Plus there are some honored former players up there too.
Displays Ranking: 3 out of 6
Cost
Close-by arena parking is an astounding $15 – $20, which is just robbery for an OHL event in a smaller city. Going a little further out, the city garages are $10, but they are cash-only (word of warning if coming from the States). Ticket prices are similar to several other teams around the Province as they average $20, $29 and $35.
Cost Ranking: 6 out of 8
Fan Support
The last game of the regular season drew a decent crowd here on a Sunday Afternoon as the building was about 75% full. That is in contrast as to how the team ranks in the OHL Paid Attendance standings as they have decreased and gone from 8th to 13th to 16th over the last three seasons.
Fan Support Ranking: 5 out of 8
Attendance
Any time I’ve been to a non-NHL hockey game in Ontario, it surprises me how dull and not into the game the crowd is. I’d love to hear why. It’s happened to me with Barrie, Kingston, Hamilton and now here. I’m really hoping to see something different when I eventually see the most popular teams in London, Kitchener and Guelph. Anyway, I will say that Niagara had more life than the earlier mentioned visited teams and that was seen with a nice pop when they scored. Arms gets raised and there’s decent cheering, even if no one gets on their feet. There were a few Go Dogs Go cheers, mostly by kids. Team and player introductions were met with meek applause and the subtleties of the game didn’t offer much vocal cheering (like a successful penalty kill). Only in overtime did the crowd ramp things up and become fully invested. On a side note, holy moly is their goal horn loud!
Atmosphere Ranking: 8 out of 14
Other Stuff
The IceDogs spent their first seven seasons in the city at Jack Gatecliff Arena, one of the smallest and most basic barns in the OHL……This franchise is frequently causing trouble as they’ve been nabbed for inappropriate conduct and breaking league rules amongst other things. That makes them often a villain around the league. The logo inspired by Don Cherry’s dog is serendipitous….The Meridian Centre is also home to the Niagara River Lions of the CEBL, Canada’s top Basketball League…..St. Catharines has the nickname St. Kitts.
Game
Lots of goals in this one as Niagara closed out the regular season with an entertaining win. No team had more than a one goal lead and the IceDogs’ Riley Patterson showed his value as the Canuck prospect by scoring his 40th of the season. Most of the goals came in the 3rd period and it was 5-5 as we went to Overtime. That’s where Ethan Czata was able to easily finish a slowly developing 2-on-1 to send the fans home happy (though there were many Erie fans in attendance). The end featured a little controversy as the Otters complained the whistle should’ve blown at the other end when Niagara’s goalie covered the puck. Though it felt late, he did play the puck and that led to the winner.
Stadium and Arena Visits 
