Sprawling along the base of the saguaro-and-ocotillo-studded Superstition Mountains near Phoenix, Arizona, the city of Mesa is home to the also expansive Arizona Athletic Grounds. The facility harbors 24 playing fields (20 turf and four grass); 12 beach volleyball courts; 50 indoor volleyball courts; 16 indoor basketball courts; eight baseball diamonds; 41 pickleball courts; and spaces for cheer, jiujitsu, boxing, gymnastics, dance, and roller derby. “You name it, we host it,” says Meg Stevens, president of the Arizona Athletic Grounds. “We are one of the largest youth sports and entertainment facilities in the country.”
Across the U.S., myriad top-level youth sports venues dot the deserts, mountains, forests, and cities. Some, like the Arizona Athletic Grounds, comprehensively serve multiple sports, others focus on a sport or two they do best, and still more bolster childhood dreams of sports glory in iconic surroundings. Those who operate these venues not only passionately believe in the power of sports to develop youth athletic excellence but also in their capacity to build character, integrity, and knowledge, and foster the teamwork skills necessary
to achieve higher goals.
Lauren Siple, business development manager at The Ballpark at League City in Texas, notes another selling point—for the grown-ups. She says, “When you step into the ballpark, you feel like a kid again. You get that feeling of being somewhere special.”
The Whole Shebang
As athletes walk into the WYO Sports Ranch for the first time and gawk at the antler chandelier while taking in the sheer size of the 131,000-square-foot multisport facility, the reaction of many is a simply uttered, “Wow.” On the northern end of Casper, Wyoming, the massive, indoor facility hosts tournaments and other sports events in basketball, volleyball, flag football, and soccer—multisport tournaments often happen in the building simultaneously. “Having that flexibility is huge for us,” says Joe Hanson, general manager of the WYO Sports Ranch.
The facility has 10 basketball courts, 20 volleyball courts, a turf field for soccer and flag football, and four short-sided soccer fields. WYO Sports Ranch also has three flex rooms for conferences and trade shows. In addition, it has a sports-performance area for training and nutrition programs.
But when it comes to the WYO Sports Ranch’s effect on youth sports overall, Hanson turns philosophical. “The most important thing to me is inspiring kids to work together and become complete adults,” he says, noting the kids don’t know they are learning these things as many are simultaneously learning to have fun.
The WYO Sports Ranch is across the street from the 28,000-square-foot multipurpose Ford Wyoming Center. The WYO Sports Ranch and the center often stage sports events in tandem. The Ford Wyoming Center is home to Wyoming high school state tournaments in basketball, volleyball, wrestling, marching band, and spirit/cheer. Each June, the center also hosts the National Intercollegiate Rodeo Association College National Finals Rodeo.
The mammoth Arizona Athletic Grounds also rolls out the red carpet for many types of youth sports tournaments and events, and its capacity is substantial. Stevens says, “Over Presidents Day weekend in 2025, we had 106,000 people on-site. An average Saturday night during our peak periods [September to March], we average 23,000 people [at the facility].” Some 2.4 million visitors came through in 2024 alone, Stevens notes.
The Arizona Athletic Grounds has a 17,000-square-foot restaurant and bar, a performance center, and fitness and recovery centers on-site. In addition, the facility provides security, and it is 35 minutes from Phoenix Sky Harbor International Airport and adjacent to Mesa Gateway Airport. The former has flights via most major airlines, while the latter is serviced by Allegiant Air and Sun Country Airlines.
Stevens notes an additional hallmark of the Arizona Athletic Grounds experience is the staff. She says, “We have the best of the best. Every area has its own sports director, and they feel ownership over those events. They also are the ones here on the weekends. It’s not like you’re talking to somebody different [during the planning process]; the one who is setting up the contracts and the one running the event are the same person.”
At The Ballpark at League City in Texas between Houston and Galveston, athletes take the field to compete in many sports, including baseball, fast-pitch softball, slow-pitch softball, and flag football, with cricket potentially joining the list in the future. The City of League City operates the 35-acre facility, home to six fields, an indoor soccer arena, and two restaurants, both with 360-degree views of the on-field action. The ballpark hosted the Texas Youth World Baseball Classic in October 2024, with 23,000 athletes, coaches, and spectators—plus former major leaguer and MLB’s Houston Astros manager Dusty Baker—on the grounds.
Siple of The Ballpark at League City notes, “From our general manager to frontgate staff; sports coordinators; and maintenance, kitchen, and food and beverage staff, we all take pride in what we do, [and we seek to] leave that Disney World feeling for our guests and inspire them to want to come back to the ballpark because of that above-and-beyond mentality.”
In the Northwest, Starfire Sports in Tukwila, Washington, sits 3 miles from Seattle-Tacoma International Airport and 12 miles from downtown Seattle. Since its founding in 2003, the nonprofit has emphasized diversity and youth access to top-notch sports facilities regardless of socioeconomic status, race, gender, religion, or ability. The organization’s mission, according to its website, is “to deliver inclusive, world-class youth soccer experiences and social programs that inspire, encourage, and empower our community.”
Starfire has five grass soccer fields, eight year-round and lighted turf fields, two indoor soccer fields, and two flex spaces. The organization hosts 15 tournaments and 100,000 participants and spectators annually. Starfire offers performance-training programs and physical therapy, and the venue also is the practice facility for MLS’ Seattle Sounders FC and Major League Rugby’s Seattle Seawolves.
Doing What They Do Best
In Colorado Springs, Colorado, Dave Namesnik, general manager of The Broadmoor World Arena, is very familiar with what can happen on Zamboni-smoothed sheets of ice. “We do a lot of figure skating,” he says. “We are an Olympic training site for U.S. Figure Skating, so we host national championships and international competitions. We also host youth and amateur ice hockey tournaments, and we do learn-to-skate programs. All three sheets of ice are going from 7 in the morning to 10 at night, pretty much year-round.”
Built in 1998, The Broadmoor World Arena’s main venue is a 7,343-seat coliseum and was formerly home ice for the Colorado College Tigers men’s hockey team, which since moved to Ed Robson Arena on campus. In addition to figure skating and ice hockey, The Broadmoor World Arena has hosted wrestling, gymnastics, martial arts, basketball, volleyball, the Monster Jam motorsports event, Arenacross, rodeos, and spirit/cheer.
To top it off, the arena’s staff handles all this as a nonprofit. Namesnik explains, “We do not receive outside funding from the city or the state. We are on our own. What we make goes back into the venue and to the employees, so it is a unique setup. There are not a ton of facilities out there that are set up the way we are.”
On the other side of the country, the Greensboro Aquatic Center in North Carolina focuses primarily on swimming and diving, but also artistic swimming and water polo. The venue has 1,900 seats above the 50-meter competition pool and three additional pools. It also has a full complement of diving springboards and platforms. Greensboro Aquatic Center has hosted as many as 2,000 swimmers, which it did for the 2016 Nationwide U.S. Masters Swimming Spring National Championship. It regularly hosts 1,200 swimmers for the YMCA National Swimming Championship, including the 2025 Short Course competition held in late March and early April with 166 teams—ending with seven records set during the tournament.
David Hoover, director of aquatics at the center, says, “Our mission is to make sure everybody has a place to swim, train, and compete at any age level, whether they are just starting out swimming with one of our programs or are [already] a master swimmer. Our goal also is to provide top-quality pools and training space for [potential] future Olympians.”
Hoover also notes the Greensboro Aquatic Center staff itself is crackerjack. He says, “We have a top-of-the-line professional staff that can stage any type of event. We also have a great community here in Greensboro. We label ourselves ‘Tournament Town.’”
For youth athletes looking to up their tennis game (or parents wishing to enhance
their child’s serve-and-volley prowess), the Indian Wells Tennis Garden in Indian Wells, California, near Palm Springs, offers starry-eyed athletes the chance to play where the pros play. Home to the BNP Paribas Open and the FILA Easter Bowl Junior Championships, the facility has hosted many tennis greats, including Coco Gauff and Taylor Fritz.
The Indian Wells Tennis Garden features the second-largest tennis stadium in the world, with a 16,102-person capacity (only Arthur Ashe Stadium in New York City, New York, is larger, which hosts the U.S. Open Tennis Championships). The year-round California facility has 29 courts, 150 pro tennis coaches, and multiple restaurants and private suites. Nicknamed “Tennis Paradise,” Indian Wells Tennis Garden is a half hour from Palm Springs International Airport and 2 1/2 hours east of Los Angeles and northeast of San Diego.
Where Dreams Take Shape
Youth sports are where dreams grow and thrive. They can start small, such as aspirations of hitting a baseball for the first time, of scoring a winning goal in ice hockey or soccer, or of throwing a football in a steady spiral downfield. But as youth athletes progress in sports, many might harbor thoughts of someday making it to the big leagues: being drafted by the NFL’s Green Bay Packers after a stellar college stint playing quarterback at the University of Alabama, getting chosen for the starting lineup of the WNBA’s Minnesota Lynx, or of replacing Lionel Messi as forward for the MLS’ Inter Miami CF.
There are sports venues that bolster such ambitions of amateur athletes through their locations and associations with other iconic institutions. One is Cooperstown Dreams Park near Cooperstown, New York. Cooperstown also is home to the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum and rich with baseball history. The inspiration for Cooperstown Dreams Park, former major leaguer Lou Pressuti, is credited with saying, “Every kid in America should have the opportunity to play baseball in Cooperstown.” Pressuti’s descendants opened Cooperstown Dreams Park in 1996.
The 165-acre facility has 22 lighted, grass ball fields and 104 clubhouses. It offers
the Dreams Park Experience, and each tournament package accommodates up to
104 teams for athletes 12 and under. Every team is guaranteed (weather-permitting) six games and a maximum of 13. Players receive Cooperstown Dreams Park home and away jerseys and socks, game hats, and player warmup sets. In addition, each team has their photo displayed in the American Youth Baseball Hall of Fame on-site, regardless of their results on the field.
In Bay Lake, Florida, near Orlando, ESPN Wide World of Sports Complex has not only the cachet of ESPN and the former “Wide World of Sports” television program but also a partnership with adjacent Walt Disney World Resort, a destination that pioneered a business model of fulfilling childhood dreams. The site has an arena, baseball and softball fields, a stadium, field house, and complex for track and field.
The venue has hosted The Ripken Experience at Walt Disney World Resort (baseball), the United States Youth Soccer Association National Championship, the Amateur Athletic Union Basketball World Championships, several Disney-branded soccer tournaments, gymnastics invitationals, and youth flag football championships. The venue’s IdeaSport Soccer Academy for youth is highly regarded for its educational and training offerings. And proximity to Walt Disney World, dubbed “The Most Magical Place on Earth” by Disney, naturally, likely will excite even the most performance-focused youth athletes.
