FORT MYERS, FLA. – There are five fields at the historic Terry Park baseball complex in the city of Fort Myers. Those ballyards are occupied for the most part by Division III teams from the North at this time of year.
The Bethel Royals were assigned to the field named for Connie Mack for a doubleheader of 7-inning games starting at 9 a.m. Sunday. Mack was the owner and manager of the Philadelphia Athletics for a half-century and brought the A's here for spring training from 1925 to 1936.
The modus of arrival was either by boat or rough roads through the jungle until 1928, when Tamiami Trail – as in, Tampa to Miami – was completed.
Coach Brian Raabe, the former Twins' infielder, has his Bethel team here for 13 games and for nearly two weeks, what with the People's Stadium, a k a, the Zygi Dome, off limits to all baseball this year due to preparations for the Final Four.
The Gene Cusic Collegiate Classic draws more than 100 baseball and softball teams here from late February and to late March, allowing Minnesota visitors to southwest Florida to play quite a variety of colleges.
"We played Johns Hopkins, a top 10 team, last week and wind up next Saturday against Wooster, the No. 1 team in the country,'' Raabe said. "It's a lot of baseball, and we need it. We're younger this year. We're playing some freshmen.''
The opponent on Sunday was the College of Old Westbury, a small State of New York University located in an affluent area of Long Island.
Jake Marsh, a junior from Wayzata, was Raabe's starter for Game 1. He was Bethel's starting quarterback before last season, when Jaran Roste took over early in the schedule. Roste arrived as a transfer after having spent a year as a Gophers' walk-on.