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State baseball championships coming back to Springfield
By Joboo | January 28, 2008
There was talk of it after the finals were moved here last year, & now it’s come to fruition. State baseball is coming back to Meador Park for 2008. The full announcement can be found here. Excerpts below.
SPRINGFIELD – The Missouri State High School Activities Association announced today that its Baseball Championships will remain at Meador Park in Springfield for 2008. The 59th annual high school state championships will take place May 28-31 at the 1,500-seat facility.
Meador Park hosted the 2007 Championships on short notice after the event’s previous site in Columbia was announced as a potential NCAA Division I Regional host site. Despite the quick turnaround with the change in venues a year ago, the Meador Park experience for the participating schools, spectators and event organizers was very positive, attracting the sixth-highest attendance total in tournament history.
“Last May we made a trip to Springfield a couple of weeks before the state tournament just hoping to find a place to play and looking for a local group willing to put forth its best effort in a short amount of time,” said Dr. Kerwin Urhahn, MSHSAA Executive Director. “When the tournament actually got underway, we were tremendously impressed with the dedication this community had for the event and the hard work that so many people put into making it an overwhelming success. We wanted to reward Springfield for those efforts by bringing the baseball tournament back this spring. We hope Springfield will continue to be a vital part of our various state championship events well into the future.”
In addition to the $100,000 in improvements invested in the facility a year ago — including new dugouts, scoreboard, infield, irrigation system and public address system — the Springfield-Greene County Park Board is continuing improvements on Meador Park this spring. A new lighting system that will be fully operational in 2-3 months, and many other facility upgrades are being planned.“High school sports are an important part of our local sports scene, and the MSHSAA Championships are a big part of that,” said Jodie Adams, Director of Parks for the Springfield-Greene County Park Board. “We want to attract this event and many other high school championships to our community in the future, and we’re so grateful for the opportunity to host the Baseball Championships again this May.”
Topics: Baseball |