Athletic Facilities

In winter of 1950, CMC trustees purchased from Pomona College 24 acres east of Mills Avenue and north of Sixth Street, thanks in part to a gift from Colonel James G. Boswell. The purchase more than doubled the size of the now more than forty-acre campus and in January 1951 the trustees announced a five-year plan to develop the property into five tennis courts and athletic fields for intramural and freshman football, track, and basketball. By October 1952, crews and equipment donated by the Bressi and Bevanda Company were grading new athletic fields east of Mills Avenue, and plans were underway for at least four tennis courts, a field house, basketball pavilion, swimming pool, full-size football field with a running track, baseball diamond, and volleyball courts.

Left: An aerial photograph of the CMC campus looking east shows the locations of the baseball field, tennis courts, and football field and track east of Mills Avenue, 1957.

Founding President George C. S. Benson and baseball coach William "Bill" Arce during the Arce Field dedication ceremony, Spring 1981.

North Field, located just east of Mills Avenue, was the original location of the Claremont-Mudd baseball field and an accompanying softball field. With the construction of Bauer Center in 1968, the baseball field was moved to its present location at Claremont Boulevard and Ninth Street in time for the 1969-70 academic year. In spring 1981, the baseball field was renamed and dedicated to longtime baseball coach and athletic director William “Bill” Arce during the Alumni Baseball Classic.

An aerial photograph of Burns Stadium and Zinda Field.

CMC’s outdoor stadium complex was completed in 1954 and was a signal of Claremont Men’s College’s desire to move away from the joint athletic and physical education partnership with Pomona College towards forming its own athletics program. South Field was first used in April 1955 (Benson, p. 31) and would become the home to Claremont-Mudd and later, Claremont-Mudd-Scripps football and track and field teams. Concrete football bleachers were added to the field in 1968 at the cost of $80,000, thanks to gifts from Parents’ Committee member Willard Voit P’59 and longtime CMC trustee chairman Garner Beckett, president of the American Cement Corporation, who donated 400 barrels of cement. In 1995, the CMS football field was renamed Zinda Field in honor of longtime football coach and athletic director John Zinda, who passed away after a battle with cancer. Zinda Field was officially dedicated on November 11, 1995 as part of a Homecoming celebration for the season finale against Pomona-Pitzer. In 1997, the football stadium was renamed Burns Stadium in honor of Fritz B. Burns when broadcast-quality lights and other improvements were made to the field.

Ducey Gymnasium, circa 1970s.

A gymnasium on the CMC campus was built for use by the fall of 1957. Constructed at the end of the joint Pomona-Claremont athletics era, the gymnasium would provide an important venue for sporting events for the forthcoming Claremont-Mudd Stags athletics teams. At a cost of $150,000 and encompassing 13,280 square feet, the gymnasium was designed by architects Heitschmidt and Thompson and built by the Ford J. Twait Company. In 1969, weight and wrestling rooms were added to the gym. The gymnasium was renamed Ducey Gymnasium in September 1974 in honor of physical education professor and longtime basketball and tennis coach Ted Ducey P'73, who died tragically in a flash flood accident. As the decades passed and additional sports and female athletes were added to the mix, additional square footage was added, including the Wells Fitness Center, made possible by a bequest from Pomona College graduate and Walt Disney Company president Frank Wells. Ducey Gymnasium would serve Claremont-Mudd and later CMS Athletics for 57 years, before being demolished in 2014 in preparation for the construction of Roberts Pavilion.

Swimmers in Voit Pool, circa 1959.

CMC parent Willard Voit P’59, president of the Voit Rubber Company, donated $25,000 for a swimming pool adjacent to the recently completed gymnasium, which was to be named after him following his son’s graduation from CMC in 1959. Other gifts brought in additional funds to meet the $52,758 building cost and construction on the L-shaped facility on the north side of the gymnasium began in short order. The pool was ready for use for the academic year 1959-60 and, in 1961, thanks to a second gift from the CMC parent, Voit Field House was completed.

An intramural flag football game on Pritzlaff Field.

1984 saw the opening of Pritzlaff Field as the new home to CMS soccer. The facility was funded by the Pritzlaff Family in honor of John Pritzlaff III '76, who helped Claremont-Mudd to back-to-back men’s soccer SCIAC Championships in 1974 and 1975. Located between East Sixth Street and North Claremont Boulevard, Pritzlaff Field provides a dedicated facility the Claremont-Mudd-Scripps men’s and women’s soccer teams’ practices and games and also includes an adjoining softball field for the Athenas softball team. In addition to hosting athletics events, Pritzlaff Field is also home to CMC’s commencement ceremony each year.

Swimming pool and facilities at the Axelrood Aquatics Center.

The Axelrood Aquatics Center, named after planned giving donor Matt M. Axelrood, was dedicated on September 26, 1993. Replacing Voit Pool, Axelrood was an immediate upgrade as Voit Pool was smaller than official regulation size, which often resulted in multiple heats needed for home swimming events. The new aquatics center was a welcome addition as CMS aquatic sports were in the middle of a prolonged dynasty when they moved into their new home. Today, Axelrood is home to the Stags and Athenas water polo and swimming and diving teams, along with the ever-popular late-night intramural innertube water polo matches.

Tennis courts at the Biszantz Family Tennis Center.

Dedicated in January 2009, the Biszantz Family Tennis Center provided new, state-of-the-art tennis facilities for CMS Athletics and ushered in a new era for the Stags and Athenas tennis program.  Made possible through the generous support of CMC Trustee Gary Biszantz '56 P'08 and others, the Biszantz Family Tennis Center served as the host facility for the NCAA Division III Men's Tennis Championships in spring 2009 and has been considered one of the finest facilities in collegiate tennis–winning the 2009 Outdoor Tennis Facility of the Year Award presented by the American Sports Builders Association and chosen as one of the seven winners of the United States Tennis Association (USTA) 29th annual USTA Facility Awards Program, recognizing excellence in construction and/or renovation of tennis facilities throughout the country. The Center features 12 post-tensioned DecoTurf tennis courts; permanent seating on each court, with a centrally located observation deck overlooking all the courts; a clubhouse with locker rooms, coaches' offices, classroom, and two electronic scoreboards; plus, a turf recreational/practice field adjacent to the facility. The Biszantz Family Tennis Center is also open for recreational play and physical education classes to students, faculty, and staff of Claremont McKenna College, Harvey Mudd College, and Scripps College.

Roberts Pavilion at sunset.

By the late 1990s, CMS Athletics had swelled to 21 varsity programs and was a nationally prominent athletic department. There was a dire need for more space for locker rooms, coaching offices, and meeting rooms. Multiple plans were considered over many years for how to address the pressing needs for additional locker rooms, competition space, and coaches' offices. President Pamela Gann worked with CMC trustee and George R. Roberts ’66 P’93 to envision a completely new facility to replace Ducey Gymnasium. Opening in 2016, Roberts Pavilion became a transformative fitness and events center and the athletic center for the Claremont-Mudd-Scripps intercollegiate, intramural, and physical education programs. Now one of the top Division III facilities anywhere in the country, Roberts Pavilion was designed by John Friedman/Alice Kimm Architects. The LEED Gold-certified Roberts Pavilion encompasses more than 144,000 square feet on three levels dedicated to CMS athletics and community fitness. The Pavilion features a generous venue area with a seating capacity of approximately 2,200, providing hosting opportunities for important college and community events, as well as the state-of-the-art Nakasone Family Fitness Center–named in honor CMC alumnus and trustee Robert C. Nakasone ’69 P’93 P’95 P’98 P’01 GP’23. Despite replacing Ducey Gymnasium, the legacies of Ted Ducey and the gymnasium continue to live on in Roberts Pavilion–the Pavilion is home to the Ted Ducey CMS Hall of Fame and donor acknowledgement walls are made from wood panels that were once the bleachers in Ducey Gym.