Product Description
Basketball, Cheerleading, Sports, Volleyball, Quality leagues, Tournaments, Clinics
The McLaughlin Athletic Center (MAC), located in Antwerp, Ohio, is Paulding County, Ohio’s home for organized athletic events, including gymnastics, indoor basketball, volleyball, and fitness activities. We proudly serve Northwest Ohio and Northeast Indiana.
In 1972 a major addition was made to the Antwerp Local Schools and included a then state of the art gymnasium and elementary classrooms. The “New Gym”, as called by the Antwerp community, was a huge community improvement from the “Old Gym” that was built in 1936 and had been used since. The “New Gym” was now home to the existing boys varsity and JV teams as well as new organized high school sports of girls volleyball and basketball. The gymnasium was also home to countless music concerts and years of graduation ceremonies. Outside of the academic classrooms, the new gym was the main draw for the Antwerp Local Schools until the school moved to its new current site in December 2004.
A property sale by the state of Ohio in 2005 led to a purchase of the facility by a group that was headed by Thomas McLaughlin III. The purpose of the purchase was to renovate the former 1972 elementary facility addition into an assisted living complex. Unneccesary for the assisted living complex, the gym was closed off, used for storage and sat idle.
As the assisted living campus developed and began to host residents, the Antwerp Community Fellowship Care Campus (ACFCC) group was developed to have input from outside the assisted living campus and helped keep the campus residents in touch with the community. From this ACFCC group, it was proposed to put the gym back into use and draw the community in to enlighten the residents, as well as a community center to be used to draw folks from outside communities into Antwerp.
In fall of 2011 the first basketball league was established. 55 boy and girl players, their parents and fans started playing in a gym with a filthy floor, no water, no restrooms, few lights and no heat. These monies, in addition to every league and tournament since, have helped repair all of these issues and more.
The campus has grown into a full service sporting facility. The two court gym now offers league and tournament events in all four seasons in volleyball and basketball for ages K thru adult. Below the gym Northwest Ohio Cheer has established gymnastics and cheerleading events and the 1936 gym is still in use and houses the new Antwerp Wrestling Club and their teams.
