Matt McCaffrey has been involved in Temecula roller hockey since he moved to the city as a kid in 1994.

That was back when the games were played on blacktop at Margarita Middle School, almost prehistoric in terms of surfaces.

Then a rink opened at Ronald Reagan Sports Park about a year later, and to go from an uneven playground surface to a new space was a huge high, McCaffrey said.

Time marches on and now it’s the sports park’s surface that desperately needs to be upgraded. Last month, the city closed the place down for a project expected to cost about $3 million and be finished by January, said Nino Abad, senior engineer for the city of Temecula.

McCaffrey said the surface was unsafe and people were hurt as a result, including players in the league he’s involved in, Temecula Valley Inline Hockey Association. Even his wife, Ryann, suffered a broken index finger and had surgery on her wrist after her skate wheels got caught in a crack.

As a result, he said the hockey league switched its games to the rink at Michael “Mike” Naggar Community Park on Margarita Road.

Abad said the city has no record of reported injuries at the Reagan rink.

The surface is concrete. “It is nearly 30 years old and shows typical wear and tear,” he said.

The rink at the Margarita Road park is also concrete, but was built more recently, Abad said.

The new rink at the Reagan park will have a new sports tile play surface as well as acrylic safety glass around the entire place. There will be a metal roof that will cover the playing surface, Abad said. The old rink did not have one.

Other updates include a new scoreboard, lighting, drinking fountain, Americans with Disabilities Act improvements and a fan system to improve air flow, he said.

Sounds like it’ll be a great place to play, and the shade should make it more comfortable, too.

McCaffery said the rink was due for a makeover. “The weather has gotten the best of it over the years,” he said.

As a dad, McCafferty, now 39, said hockey has become a passion for his family, just like for him growing up.

He stopped playing in the early 2000s when he started working part time while attending Temecula Valley High School.

He got back into it in 2016 when his oldest daughter, Rylie, decided to play.

“I will never forget watching her practicing” that first season, “helplessly falling back in love with the sport I once loved as a kid,” he recalled.

The following season, he coached her team and subsequently has been president and vice president of the association’s board, and also headed up officials.

He said more than 100 adults and kids from the association went to a Temecula City Council meeting in 2021 to voice concerns about the Reagan rink, but also to “reiterate our passion for the sport and express our gratitude for having a local place to play.”

Given the big investment the city is making in the rink, it seems their voices were heard.

McCaffery said his other children, Erin and Matthew, also play in the league. Adult leagues for men and women operate as well. About 220 kids and 180 adults are now involved, he said.

There’s a certain kind of poetry McCaffery sees in what’s played out; he was one of the first residents to play in the Reagan rink when it opened in the mid-1990s and was one of the last to skate on it before it closed for a makeover.

As to the future, he hopes the city continues to invest in the sport so one day he “will have the opportunity to introduce my future grandchildren to this amazing sport that has done so much for my family and I.”

Sounds like there’s more poetry to be made.

Reach Carl Love at carllove4@yahoo.com.