BASEBALL: Lamar announces new home turfs
Published 3:34 pm Wednesday, October 24, 2018
Lamar sports information
BEAUMONT — In accordance with the vision of President Dr. Kenneth R. Evans for the campus of Lamar University, Cardinal baseball will take a step into the future this offseason with the installation of a state-of-the-art playing surface at Vincent-Beck Stadium.
Groundbreaking for the new Hellas Construction turf took place on Oct. 22 with a scheduled completion of Spring 2019.
“We are excited to be working with such a reputable company as Hellas,” said head coach Will Davis. “Their list of clients and the reviews from those clients is very exciting, and their proximity to us in Houston should provide a great working relationship.”
Hellas Construction will be installing their Fusion Triple Play turf in the infield and Fusion XP2 in the outfield of “The Beck”. The Triple Play surface features a polyurethane layer that locks the fibers into a tight position. The result means a truer bounce of the baseball for infielders.
The XP2 is designed for outfielders to get more consistent bounces from the ball after it is hit. The field is designed to reduce maintenance and rainouts, which will provide significant savings for the Cards in the long term.
The baseball field isn’t the only stadium that will feature Hellas Construction turf. The Cardinal football program had the Matrix Turf with its patented Realfill silica pea gravel base installed at Provost Umphrey Stadium in 2010.
“We are very excited to once again be working with Hellas Construction,” said LU Director of Athletics Marco Born. “Hellas is one of the leaders in sport facility construction and turf installation. We built a strong relationship with them during the installation of the Matrix Turf at Provost Umphrey Stadium and 2010. The installation is under way at Vincent-Beck Stadium and we’re looking forward to the 2019 season.”
The 2019 season begins on Feb. 15 with the first of a three-game series against LIU-Brooklyn. The Cards will host 28 games on the new field at Vincent-Beck, part of a 56-game regular season that hopefully includes a return to the Southland Conference tournament. The entire schedule can be found here.
Season ticket sales are scheduled to start in January of 2019, and individual ticket sales will begin soon after the release of season tickets.