It’s a Saturday night deep in football country and OU is on the TV. But the WeStreet Ice Center in midtown Tulsa is a hockey hotbed.
The Tulsa Jr. Oilers’ 12U team plays on one of WeStreet’s two sheets of ice. On the other, several players skate around, practicing their skills. In the pro shop, a young player tries on new skates.
“I would argue to say this facility, the WeStreet, is one of the top youth hockey facilities in the country,” Klage Kaebel, hockey director for the Jr. Oilers and head coach of the 12U team, said before his team took the ice. “I mean, it’s incredible. That’s the growth I’ve seen, is just in excitement. There’s been good hockey people here, but then you bring a facility like this, and excitement around town.”
As recent as five years ago, the expansion would have been hard to imagine. Even though Tulsa has been home to professional ice hockey for nearly 100 years, football has ruled the region. Oklahoma isn’t home to a NHL franchise, with the Oilers playing in the minor league ECHL. In other words, no one is crowding bars to watch the Stanley Cup playoffs.
Hockey remains niche and expensive in the state. Preserving ice and finding equipment have been longstanding challenges, and the sport’s limited awareness and lack of school hockey programs hinder its growth.
Until 2024, Tulsa had only one sheet of ice that its youth teams and the Oilers shared at the Oilers Ice Center at 63rd and Mingo. At one point, the city had several skating rinks, according to Nathan Paul, an Oilers fan and avid jersey collector who moved to Tulsa in 1992.
“Little by little, they would slip away,” Paul said. “The old Oilers Ice Center always remained because that was where the Oilers needed to practice.”
Tulsa’s hockey culture began to change in 2021, when IT executive Andy Scurto bought the Oilers. Scurto hails from the San Jose area, where his daughter played youth hockey for the San Jose Jr. Sharks. After moving to Tulsa, he saw an opportunity to build a hockey town in an unconventional place.
The site of the old Macy’s at the shuttered Promenade Mall seemed like the perfect spot. Scurto wanted more than just a rink. In early 2024, the WeStreet Ice Center opened at 41st and Yale with two sheets of ice — including one with arena-style seating. It also features a pro shop stocked with gear and Oilers merchandise, a restaurant, an arcade and the Oilers’ team offices. The team also practices there.
Eighteen columns were removed from the site of each rink, replaced with a reverse truss structure. The lone remnant from the Macy’s is the escalator that runs up the center of the building.
The facility’s impact extended beyond hockey.
“The parking garage had kind of been overtaken due to the homelessness problem,” said Zack Reynolds, broadcaster and director of media relations for the Oilers. “While better here than most large cities, it’s still a problem that the city faces, and so that area had become a bit of a rough spot. I think that now that WeStreet’s there, there’s obviously the economic impact of that, and I believe it really helped keep the Genesis Health Clubs over there in business.”
The WeStreet Ice Center also helped Tulsa land a North American 3 Hockey League (NA3HL) team — the first junior hockey team of its kind in the city. The NA3HL Oilers launched in the 2024-25 season with athletes playing two to three games over a weekend, either at home or on the road. Combined with practices, that’s a lot of ice time.
“It was why we got the NA3HL team,” Ashley Toothman, whose 7-year-old son, Doak, plays on the Jr. Oilers 8U team, said of the WeStreet Ice Center. “We’re able to host more tournaments. The ice time is spread out more, instead of trying to cram all these kids into one rink five days a week.”
“Not just the figure skaters, hockey players, curling,” added Mark Compton, Toothman’s partner. “Those are the organized sports that vie for ice time, but also people will rent the rink out for birthday parties, gatherings.”
The facility’s pro shop was another welcome addition for the hockey community. For the first time, the city has a dedicated hockey store. Before WeStreet opened, the easiest way to get gear was to order it online. That meant no opportunity to try on equipment.
“If your knee pads blew out and you had a game this weekend, you’re kind of screwed,” Compton said. “You’d have to rely on the community, like, ‘Anybody got extra pads?’
Now, the family has somewhere to pick up new equipment — and more ice time.
Miles Bolton is a sports journalist who wrote this story as part of a graduate journalism course at New York University.
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