Center Ice Café

Center Ice Café is a defunct college cafeteria, formerly located on the southwestern side of the campus of Ferris State University in Big Rapids. It was themed heavily around sports, especially the campus' Bulldog hockey team.

Fall 2006
Further viewing: Southwest Commons on Google Maps

At one point, there were four major noteworthy cafeterias on campus: The Rock Café, Center Ice, Mascar, and Westview. Westview was finally closed when the Rankin Center was taken down and replaced with the University Center, some time after the Dozerfleet founder graduated. Mascar was shut down by the end of spring of 2008.

This left just the Rock, Center Ice, Quiznos, and a student food store that opened up serving cafeteria food for students during operational hours. The on-campus Quiznos would later shut down in 2014, as the company at its corporate level restructured under chapter 11 bankruptcy.

Center Ice finally closed its doors after the summer of 2009, forcing Bond Hall students in love with the diner to adapt to walking an extra 8th of a mile uphill to eat at The Rock instead. Last-minute snacking at 10:00 PM was no longer an option.

While Center Ice was operational, it had a very hockey-themed interior, celebrating hockey history in general but also celebrating Ferris' hockey team. It had an a-la-carte style of acquiring food, as opposed to the straight buffet method utilized at Rock and Westview. On evenings when bored, the Dozerfleet founder would sometimes purchase a pizza here and eat dinner while watching whatever was on cable TV that looked interesting. It briefly was brought back as the Westside Cafe, but was then converted to the Southwest Commons.