By Rodney Haas 
605 Sports 

MITCHELL — The Mitchell Kernels playing basketball at the Corn Palace has been a tradition for generations of both Kernel fans and Mitchell High School alumni for years. 

But this year, the Kernels will only be playing a handful of games at the 100-year old historic basketball arena, and instead will play a majority of their games at the new high school that opened this fall that also includes a new $17 million athletic facility.  

“It's a tough one for me,” said Mitchell High athletic director Cory Aadland. “I'm a traditionalist and the history of those kinds of things. The pull for the Corn Palace for those reasons is tough but again when you've got a $17 million athletic facility funded by taxpayers, it's hard not to use that and be able to enjoy some of the modern conveniences that will be here at the high school.” 

Both basketball teams open the season at Watertown on Dec. 16 and will host Rapid City Stevens and Rapid City Central next weekend at the Corn Palace, as the high school is hosting a gymnastics meet. The Kernels will again play at the Corn Palace as part of the Hoop City Classic and the girls will play Pierre there in February due to the high school hosting a regional wrestling tournament. 

“The most surprising thing that has come out of this new school, is the amount of support that we have to play basketball games at the high school,” Aadland said. “I know there’s a group of people that don't agree with it and don't support that move, but I’ve heard more support for it than negative comments against it.”

The new gym will have a seating capacity of 2,000 which is less than the Corn Palace’s 3,000, but Aadland said he feels the smaller capacity will improve the atmosphere, especially when the gym is packed.   

“It’s going to be a really good venue for high school basketball,” he said. “It’s going to be a great venue for all of our sports. Even the people I think that were on the fence about the move to the high school for basketball games, even a lot of those people once they got into the gym and saw it, they’ve come around.”  

Because of the new school, Mitchell will once again host the state gymnastics meet in February after hosting it at the Corn Palace in 2022. That year, the gymnastics meet caused the annual DWU/Culvers Classic, which is typically held at the Corn Palace on the same weekend, to be moved to Salem.   

“We don’t have a large venue so we are not going to draw those large venues,” Aadland said of Mitchell hosting state events. “We have to find our niche in some of those other events that we can hold. We wouldn’t be able to host gymnastics in Mitchell if we didn’t have the high school to do it because of the conflict with the Corn Palace. So that lets us host state events that we wouldn't have been able to do anyway.” 

The new gym is part of a new high school Mitchell opened this year across the street from the old school that dates back to the early 1960s. The upgrade of the athletic facilities were originally part of initial design of the new school, but as construction costs soared during the design phase of the project, the school board decided to get rid of athletic costs of the project. It was only included after the school district went to the voters and asked for a bond which was overwhelmingly passed. 

“It’s going to take me a while to get tired of people telling me they are jealous of our facilities because that has been something that we haven’t had for a very long time,” Aadland said. 

In previous years, the Kernel basketball teams would have difficulties scheduling practices at the Corn Palace which is also home to the Dakota Wesleyan University men's and women’s basketball teams as well as other basketball classics during the winter. But because of the new facilities, Aadland was able to do something no Mitchell High athletic director has been able to do before — take a 15 minute walk around the school and watch both girls and boys basketball practices along with wrestling practice.   

“This has been a five-year project for those of us involved in it and to go back to infancy days of the dreams of what this might look like and getting it filled with kids and getting it used for its intended purpose has been pretty rewarding,” Aadland said.