Amerks and Knighhawks have New Game Day Manager

[hockey13]

Rochester, September 1... Caitlin Davis, who spent her sports career in San Jose, now heads east to join the Rochester Americans and Knighthawks as the Game Day Manager for the 2009-10 American Hockey League season and the 2010 National Lacrosse League season.

“We’re extremely excited to have Caitlin join our organization,” said Amerks VP of Production John Catalano. “She should bring a fresh, new attitude to game production.”

Davis will be responsible for all the game day activities, which will include pregame festivities, in-game entertainment and booking all anthem singers for the two professional sports teams. She is available to book potential national anthem singers and entertainers at cdavis@amerks.com or at (585) 454-5335, ext. 3004.

Davis comes to Rochester from the San Jose Stealth of the National Lacrosse League. While in San Jose, she worked as the director of game operations, while also serving as one of the team’s account executives.

As the director of game operations, Davis implemented and ran all game day operations, managed a team responsible for all game day duties and conducted pregame briefings with full-time staff, promotions and the arena management. She was also responsible for all pregame, in-game, halftime, postgame events and set-up requirements.

When not attending to her game day responsibilities, Davis sold and managed season and group tickets where she excelled. She was a key contributor to the Stealth’s 37-percent attendance increase last season, finishing second in season seat revenue, group revenue and overall revenue.

Prior to joining the Stealth, Davis was the group sales manager, responsible for selling group and individual tickets for various shows and entertainment at HP Pavilion in San Jose.

The Philadelphia native holds a bachelor’s of science degree in kinesiology, with an emphasis in sports management, from San Jose State University. While at San Jose State, Davis assisted with the marketing of the 2007 football season by developing and executing a marketing plan for the Spartans’ Division I program.

http://www.amerks.com/default.aspx?newsID=746

[Charlie]

Wow... That's a solid person to bring in.

[hockey13]

Yup, I will give credit where credit is do, the management has really stepped up to the plate this off season with Nolan, vet players, etc.. Now if we can only get the fans back in the building.

[Charlie]

Hopefully she will re-engineer the game night experience carefully... Keeping some of the old, and going tastefully forward with the new.

[bucky]

Nice to see someone coming in from out of town and not just some local with marginal experience.

[dih]

Seems like a good hire. Hopefully, she will not just focus on entertaining the kids that come to the game

[Dorky Dave]

Nothing against her as she seems like a good hire, I just feel bad for those from the Rochester area that might also been just as qualified for the job, while bringing a bit of amerk history to the fore front.

I wish her well as well all agree that the game day experience does need a little help.

Hopefully she will bring back score-o

[bdaly]

There probably aren't a ton of people with solid sports management experience sitting on the sidelines in Rochester. With sports management/marketing, people tend to have to be fairly mobile.

With what she was up against with San Jose last year (a city that has never supported that team well, and rumors from good sources that last season would be the last before the season), the gains they saw were impressive. So, hopefully that'll make her task here "easy."

[Charlie]

I don't feel bad... They went out and got somebody that, on paper seems to be incredibly qualified. In the game-day production side of things, this franchise has been screaming for someobody outside the fold to start calling the shots.

[bdaly]

Yep, exactly. Someone fresh is exactly what the doctor ordered. If you take someone who has been around everything for the last several years, you're going to get more of the same.

[sleddog]

From San Jose, CA........to........Rochester, NY????????? Must be in the Witness Protection Program, or something. But seriously..........................

Caitlin, if you can find a way to put 11,000 fannies in the seats on K-Hawks game nights (in this economy), I'll personally wash your feet at the X at half-time.

Welcome to your new home. I think you'll find some of the best fans in the world here in Rochacha.

[Dorky Dave]

Originally Posted by bdaly

Yep, exactly. Someone fresh is exactly what the doctor ordered. If you take someone who has been around everything for the last several years, you're going to get more of the same.

Then again if you take someone that has been successful with say the Wings like a Will Rumble or the like and give them free reins with the Amerks- Hawks it would be interesting also.

Like I said nothing against her and I do hope she is successful as we all improvement is needed, just sometimes it is nice to give the hometown discount to someone.

[bdaly]

Originally Posted by Dorky Dave

Then again if you take someone that has been successful with say the Wings like a Will Rumble or the like and give them free reins with the Amerks- Hawks it would be interesting also.

If we were talking group sales or ad sales, I'd agree with you. But we're talking presentation, and I don't think minor league baseball is very transferable to hockey or the NLL. In fact, I think some on this board would be up in arms if they tried to transfer some of the stuff (hokey but family friendly) they do at Wings games to hockey or lax. Plus, their best tactic -- fireworks -- doesn't always go well in arenas, as we've seen.