FROM CBD NEWS SOURCE
Big Ten
Park Ridge, Ill. – The Big Ten Conference announced on Friday the sites for its 2013 and 2014 baseball tournaments. The 2013 Big Ten Baseball Tournament will be held at Target Field in Minneapolis, the home of Major League Baseball’s Minnesota Twins, marking the first time that the event will be held at a Major League Baseball facility. The 2014 tournament will be held at TD Ameritrade Park in Omaha, Neb., the site of the NCAA Division I Men’s College World Series.
The Big Ten Baseball Tournament has been played as a neutral-site event in Columbus, Ohio, since 2009. The event was held at Huntington Park, the home of the Triple-A Columbus Clippers, in 2009 and 2011 and will be played at that ballpark May 23-26, 2012. The tournament was held at Ohio State’s Bill Davis Stadium in 2010. Prior to 2009, the Big Ten Baseball Tournament was played at the site of the regular-season champion or the champion from a pre-selected division, with the exception of 1993 and 1994, when it was held in Battle Creek, Mich.
Five different teams have won the Big Ten Tournament in the event’s 31 years. Minnesota leads all Big Ten teams with nine tournament titles, Michigan and Ohio State each have eight, Illinois has four, and Indiana has two.
The 2013 tournament will be the seventh played in Minneapolis, as Minnesota hosted the event in 1984, 1986, 2000, 2002, 2003 and 2004. The 2014 tournament will be the Big Ten’s first in Omaha and the state of Nebraska.
Tickets for the 2012 Big Ten Baseball Tournament at Huntington Park in Columbus, Ohio, are on sale now. Visit www.bigten.org for more information.
About the Big Ten Conference
The Big Ten Conference is an association of world-class universities whose member institutions share a common mission of research, graduate, professional and undergraduate teaching and public service. Founded in 1896, the Big Ten has sustained a comprehensive set of shared practices and policies that enforce the priority of academics in student-athletes’ lives and emphasize the values of integrity, fairness and competitiveness. Big Ten universities provide in excess of $100 million in athletic scholarship aid to more than 8,700 men and women student-athletes who compete for 25 championships, 12 for men and 13 for women. Conference institutions sponsor broad-based athletic programs with more than 270 teams. For more information, visit www.bigten.org.
About Target Field
Target Field, one of America’s most urban ballparks, is located in the historic Warehouse District of downtown Minneapolis. In 2011, the Sports Business Journal and Sports Business Daily named Target Field the Sports Facility of the Year. In 2010, ESPN The Magazine ranked Target Field as the best stadium experience in all professional sports in North America. Designed by POPULOUS with Mortenson Construction serving as construction manager, the 39,500 seat ballpark was completed in 2010. For more information on Target Field, visit www.twinsbaseball.com/targetfield.
About TD Ameritrade Park
Home to the NCAA Division I Men’s College World Series and Creighton Bluejays baseball, TD Ameritrade Park Omaha seats approximately 24,000, including luxury suites and club seats, and feature a 360-degree walk-around concourse for a perfect view of the field. The stadium is also home to the Red Sky Music Festival held in July. TD Ameritrade Park Omaha opened in April 2011. It is managed by the Metropolitan Entertainment & Convention Authority. For more information about TD Ameritrade Park Omaha, visit www.tdameritradeparkomaha.com.
