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Former American Press sportswriter Carl Dubois blogs about the games people play, in and out of sports, and the people you meet between and outside the lines.

Carl is an award-winning reporter and columnist living in the Willamette Valley in northwest Oregon, near Portland. He is sports editor of the News-Register newspaper in McMinnville, Ore.

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Opening Night, one week from tonight

Posted February 13, 2009 at 7:00 pm
Filed Under Sports | 2 Comments

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BATON ROUGE — At this time next Friday, LSU is scheduled to open the 2009 college baseball season in its new Alex Box Stadium. Tonight I spoke by phone with the nephew of the late LSU baseball and football star and World War II hero for whom the old and new ballparks were named. He’s excited.

Not only is the stadium the namesake of Alex Box, so is the nephew who lives near Augusta, Ga. He too is Alex Box, and I wrote about him, his famous uncle and his father in May before the closing of the old Box.

There was so much to the story, I put together some leftovers for anyone interested.

The younger, surviving Alex Box, 64, spoke tonight about the trip he and his wife, Pat, will make next week for Opening Night of the season and of the new stadium. He and other family members have been planning this for a long time, and the anticipation is building.

It doesn’t hurt that LSU is ranked No. 1 in two major preseason polls.

Sam Box, older brother of the late Alex Box, is scheduled to make the trip by ambulance from his nursing home in Mobile, Ala., and at least be at LSU’s new stadium for pregame ceremonies. If you read from the links above, you’ll discover that I met with Sam on a couple of occasions and was fascinated by the stories he told of growing up in Mississippi with the oldest of his three younger brothers.

Alex the nephew said he’ll present some memorabilia to LSU at the game, adding to the collection already entrusted to the university since the early ’90s.

“I’m really looking forward to being down there and seeing the new stadium,” he said. “It looks like it’s really going to be something special.”

I hope you’re able to attend if you were lucky enough to score tickets. First pitch is scheduled for 7 p.m. next Friday, the 20th. LSU’s opponent: Villanova.

Here is a fan guide to the new ballpark, and also from LSUsports.net is a Jan. 26 construction update  by means of a photo gallery.

Comments

2 Responses to “Opening Night, one week from tonight”

  1. Wayne from Fairhope AL on February 17th, 2009 2:57 pm

    Hi Carl,
    Just can’t wait!
    Are you going to be blogging regularly during the season?
    I hope you are able to be a part of Tiger baseball coverage this year in some way or another that I can follow.

  2. Carl Dubois on February 17th, 2009 3:37 pm

    Hi Wayne,

    Good to hear from you. I have been negotiating a job with a Web site to cover LSU baseball like I did last year, but it doesn’t look promising at this point. You’ll have to enjoy the season without my blogging, probably, but I’m sure you’ll have a great time following LSU. Should be an exciting season with the stadium opening and the high ranking. Thanks for all of your comments. I’ve enjoyed our correspondence over the years. Take care of yourself.

    Carl

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