The Chicago Stars Football Club, a professional women’s soccer team, is set to get its first permanent home in the club’s 20-year history, with Bannockburn approving several items on April 13 related to a new performance center along Interstate 94.
According to the Stars’ website, construction could begin as soon as this spring, with the goal of opening and fully hosting team training operations in 2027. Plans include two full-sized fields and a goalkeeper training pitch, a seasonal inflatable dome, a weight room, recovery equipment, as well as spaces for offices and media.
The Chicago Stars Football Club, formerly called the Chicago Red Stars, was a founding member of the now-defunct Women’s Professional Soccer League, and has played in the National Women’s Soccer League since 2013. The NWSL is one of the most prominent leagues in the country for women’s soccer.
Notable former Stars members include National Soccer Hall of Fame inductee Shannon Boxx, and two-time gold medalist Lindsay Tarpley.
Chicago Stars representatives who spoke during the village meeting emphasized how the center will mark a major milestone for the club, founded in 2006.
Laura Ricketts, executive chairperson of Chicago Stars and co-owner of the Chicago Cubs, said the Stars had been “a very distressed club” when a group of predominantly female investors, headed by Ricketts, took over in 2023. Now, the club is “coming into its own.”
Despite 20 years in the region, the club had “never been given its due,” she said. Finally giving the Stars their own facility is important to the “incredible” and “world-class athletes” on the club, Ricketts said.
“I can’t overstate just what a difference this is going to make for these players who’ve never had a field of their own to play on,” she said. “They’ve always been using borrowed facilities on someone else’s time. Now it’s their time to have their own.”
In a statement, club president Karen Leetzow expressed her gratitude to Bannockburn for its support, saying the Stars are “proud to partner with a community that so closely aligns with our values.”
The center will be a “female-first training facility,” Leetzow said, that will “elevate professional women’s sports while inspiring future generations of athletes both locally and beyond.”
“This is a momentous step forward as we continue investing in the long-term success and growth of our club,” she said.
Leetzow also spoke during the April 13 meeting, saying the center will become a “home” for the players.
“If you can imagine what this means to them to show up to work every day and have a personalized space developed by women for women to raise the game to the next level,” she said.
David Korer, Bannockburn’s village president, praised the center in a statement.
“We are excited and happy that the Chicago Stars have chosen Bannockburn for their new Performance and Training Center. It’s an exciting time for women’s sports and Bannockburn is glad to be part of it,” he said.
During the village meeting, Stars representatives gave a rundown of the facility, to sit on a roughly 10-acre site east of I-94, and just south of the former Trinity International University campus.
Plans are to keep the existing structure on the plot, with various additions and redesigns that will add “nice warm colors” and make the building look cleaner.
The two big discussion points from the club representatives centered around noise and light. Sitting along a high-traffic tollway requires the installation of sound barriers to run along the west and north sides of the property. The northern sound barrier, which will face neighboring offices, is designed to be more aesthetically pleasing, the representatives assured the board.
Stars officials said the fields’ floodlight poles will be 70 feet tall and designed to minimize light spillage and glare. They will also remain off between 8 p.m. and 7 a.m.
One representative, Steve Jacobsen, gave a personal endorsement of the effort during the presentations.
More Top Picks Cold Brew Makers
“From my perspective, you’re getting more than just a professional society. You’re getting people who care about the community, care that they’re going to do it right, and they’re going to stand behind what they’re going to do,” Jacobsen said. “You don’t always get that.”
Board members were largely supportive of the effort, with the sole dissenter being Trustee Kerry Martin, who expressed concerns about the variances the development was given and whether it would fit the curated character of the village.
“I think it’s a fundamental change,” Martin said. “The question that I can’t get past is, is this Bannockburn or not?”
Trustee Dana Zivokovich, who expressed her support for the Stars, pushed Martin on that, asking him to expand on his perceived disparity, and he reiterated his feeling that the center was a departure from the character of the village, and included changing its zoning, “which is a big deal.”
Korer countered that while residential areas of Bannockburn are “sacred,” the property in question sits along a busy tollway. And what it could bring to the village is valuable, he said, making Bannockburn a “mecca” for soccer.
Other trustees noted they preferred the Stars over rolling the dice on a potentially more industrial development taking over the site.