From home runs to touchdowns: South Bend sports bars bring fans together year-round

SOUTH BEND, Ind. -- Downtown South Bend sports bars are finding ways to keep fans coming back throughout the year.

For Shamrock Sports Bar, which opened about five months ago, the South Bend Cubs' season offered an early opportunity to welcome fans to downtown.

“We’ve gone through probably about half of a baseball season with the South Bend Cubs. It ended about three weeks ago,” says Josh Thompson, co-owner of Shamrock Sports Bar.

While Notre Dame football fans often stick to their traditional game-day spots, Thompson says the newly opened bar is attracting supporters of visiting teams games.

“The people that come into town to watch Notre Dame football game who are Notre Dame fans are probably going to go to the traditional places that they normally would,” Thompson says. “What we see a lot over here as a new business is I see a lot of, you know, the other teams' fans that come in because they might not necessarily know kind of the traditional places to.”

The bar is keeping the atmosphere lively during football season with watch parties, welcoming fans who come together to support their teams.

For locals, sports bars are about more than watching the game. They're places to connect with the community.

Christin Kloski says South Bend Brew Works has become a gathering place where she feels at home.

“I like to see Brew Works as a home away from home. It’s a place where we like, gather as a community,” Kloski says.

Kloski says Brew Works has also been the backdrop for some of her biggest personal milestones, including her engagement, buying a new house and graduating from graduate school.

“It’s been a place where I’ve had a lot of celebrations,” Kloski says. “Like when you walk in, people care about you, they ask you about your day, and it’s really hard in today’s age to feel that way.”

Thompson says that sense of connection is part of what makes watching sports in a shared space special.

“It’s fun to have an environment where people can come together and don’t necessarily know each other, but they’re all kind of cheering for that kind of same goal,” he says.

As the South Bend Cubs wrap up their season and Notre Dame football draws fans downtown, local sports bars are preparing for another stretch of game days, watch parties and community gatherings