NEW YORK — With countless halls of fame and other shrines to sports scattered across the country, fans have had no choice but to journey far and wide to pay homage to their favorite athletes.

That may change with the opening today of a new museum encompassing the full spectrum of athletic competition.

Hoping to score a grand-slam, slam-dunk hit with sports fans, the Sports Museum of America includes exhibits covering not only the major team sports but also the Olympics, golf, tennis and even bowling.

The museum even has a hall of fame of its own — the first permanent home for the women's sports hall of fame — and it will serve as the new site of the Heisman Trophy award presentation.

With artifacts ranging from the jersey Michael Jordan wore as a member of the "Dream Team" at the 1992 Olympics to the car Jimmie Johnson drove to win the 2006 NASCAR series title, the Sports Museum of America hopes to attract a million visitors a year by ranging freely across the American sports scene, something museum officials say has not been done before.

"There has never been a museum celebrating the history and significance of sport," said Philip Schwalb, founder and chief executive of the $100 million, for-profit enterprise. "We want to excite young children, motivate teenagers and inspire grown-ups."

Funded in part with $52 million in government bonds set aside to aid the recovery of lower Manhattan after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center, the museum will charge $20 to $27 for visitors to see more than 600 artifacts, 1,100 photos, 20 films and a variety of interactive displays.

Among those displays is an exhibit in the section devoted to hockey, where visitors can peer through a goalie's mask to see a video of a puck flying toward them at 120 miles an hour, with former New York Rangers goalie Mike Richter providing commentary.

Among other highlights of the museum is the American flag that was draped on goalie Jim Craig after the "Miracle on Ice" winning hockey game at the 1980 Winter Olympics, the diary that runner Jesse Owens kept during the 1936 Berlin Olympics and some of the bricks that were used to build the Indianapolis Motor Speedway a century ago.

In addition to covering the top American collegiate and professional sports, the museum includes displays about tennis, auto racing, the Olympics, soccer, figure-skating and others.

One corner of the 45,000-square-foot museum is set aside to commemorate winners of the Heisman Trophy, the most prestigious award in college football. Not only is the original trophy on display, but the annual presentation of the award will now be made at the museum.

The original home of the trophy and the site of the annual award presentation was the nearby Downtown Athletic Club, which closed after the Sept. 11 attacks and later went bankrupt. The award, which is administered by a trust, has been presented at a number of midtown Manhattan locations in the intervening years.

Another wing is devoted to the women athletes, including the Women's Sports Hall of Fame, a project of tennis champion Billie Jean King's Women's Sports Foundation.

King said she was not interested in glorifying individual athletes but in celebrating the larger lessons that sports can teach.

"I want people to believe in themselves," she said, standing near a display devoted to her career. "It's about being a champion in life, not just being a great athlete. Sports teaches some very special lessons. It teaches you to never give up, to always try, to delay gratification and work for the things that are really meaningful for you."

Among those honored in a section devoted to women coaches is Karen Kenyon, who coached fencing, softball, archery and other sports for 25 years at Maine West High School in the Chicago suburb of Des Plaines. She said coaching requires dedication and perseverance, especially when coaching an unfamiliar and difficult sport such as fencing.

"I think they chose me because I coached both a common sport — softball — as well as less-common sports," said Kenyon, who visited the museum during an opening preview Tuesday. "I'm just so proud, and finally there's a place for women's sports."

For a nation so obsessed with sports, it may be surprising that a museum dedicated to a variety of sports has not already been created. But most sports museums are at halls of fame for individual sports, Schwalb said, and many of those are in out-of-the-way places, such as the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, N.Y., or the Pro Football Hall of Fame in Canton, Ohio.

To get his museum launched, Schwalb struck partnership deals with 62 halls of fame or other sports organizations, such as national governing bodies. The Sports Museum receives artifacts and mailing lists for marketing efforts in exchange for promoting the organizations and donating money to them each year.

"If you're a real football fan, you need to go to Canton, Ohio," said Schwalb. "And we tell people that."