EKU's home field advantage on TigerTurf

TigerTurf at Turkey Hughes baseball field

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On Monday afternoon, it was raining and Eastern's baseball team was practicing. A year ago, this probably wouldn't have been the case. The Colonels weren't just practicing in preparation for a mid-week home-and-home series with Miami (Ohio), or in anticipation of a match up with the preseason OVC-favorite Eastern Illinois Panthers this weekend: They were practicing because they could.

The simple fact that Eastern is now able to practice on days where the weather isn't agreeable is a new development for the Colonels.

As a result of a $500,000 total renovation effort, the home to Eastern baseball received a new state-of-the-art synthetic turf infield.

Turkey Hughes Field, the Colonels' home since the 1960s, is now equipped with the new synthetic turf infield. The field itself cost $260,000 of the renovation funding and was raised through the university and the athletic department.

This season marks the introduction of the new infield turf at Turkey Hughes Field. The turf allows the Colonels to practice and play games that may have been canceled in previous seasons due to poor field conditions and inclement weather.

In past years, even a little rain meant Eastern's team would lose countless amounts of practice time rolling out the tarp that covered the infield. Any time the baseball team spent rolling out the tarp to cover the infield during bad weather counts against the NCAA-allotted 20 hours a week for practice time. Also, rolling back the tarp or any time the team spent repairing the field counted against those hours.

Now the Colonels won't be spending as much time rolling the tarp on and back off the field.

The new infield prevents much of that lost time, allowing the Colonels to focus more on baseball than landscaping.

"We are just simply able to be out there more," Eastern Baseball Coach Jason Stein said. "We are able to take more reps and really focus on what we are doing. We are able to experience the benefit of working on our craft, working on our game, not the field."

Simon Gray, associate director of athletics for advancement, said that the athletic department originally had plans to completely overhaul the baseball stadium and field. This plan included renovating the dugouts and bullpens, fan seating, the press box, as well as the playing field. But when funding became an issue, the athletic department decided on improving Turkey Hughes Field in increments so they would be able to make improvements more quickly.

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