Lancer Athletics dedicates new Baseball and Softball Clubhouse
Riverside, Calif. (Sept. 5, 2024) – California Baptist University dedicated its new Baseball and Softball Clubhouse on Sept. 4 in front of a crowd of donors, fans and student-athletes.
“The champions in athletics are the coaches,” Dr. Ronald L. Ellis, CBU president, said, reflecting on the newest addition to the campus and its occupants. “They're the ones who are going to be out there recruiting and developing the talent, making it a team, getting everybody working together and then going out and accomplishing time and time again as they compete. Then you’ve got to have great players. They're going to come because there are great facilities and wonderful academic programs and atmosphere.”
The clubhouse occupies the space where the former softball office and locker room stood, on Lancer Lane in the leftfield corner of the baseball outfield. The new building provides 14,411 square feet of space where both teams and staff will work to bring CBU more championships from the diamond.
The main floor houses the locker rooms for both teams, with softball's lockers residing on the east side of the building and baseball's on the west side. The locker rooms are equipped with audio and visual hookups so teams can follow conference live action during the season. Both spaces include showers, team laundry facilities, athletic training suites and kitchenettes where players can refuel after practice or between doubleheaders.
In addition to the state-of-the-art locker rooms, the clubhouse also features a lobby with an interactive database of the two programs' rosters, statistics and biographies going back to 2002. Encompassing the height of the entire building, the wall behind the interactive screen is a visual feature referred to as the Rain Wall, where over 11,000 backlit holes pull the visitor's eyes to the focal point where championship trophies are prominently displayed.
“This building alone can't bring success, but I know what our coaches and our student athletes can do with these resources,” said Dr. Micah Parker, vice president for Athletics. “It certainly helps us tell the recruits and their families that we care about athletics here.”
When arriving on the second floor of the building, visitors are met with an expansive backlit wall listing the accomplishments of the two programs over the years. This feature will be a one-stop-shop to learn about the Lancer championships, All-American honorees, conference award winners and the dozens of CBU MLB draft picks over the years. The main light feature on the upper-level consists of nine, six-foot-tall aluminum bats hanging from the ceiling tying into the purpose of the building.
Each program has five coach offices on the second floor, many with direct access to a balcony that overlooks the fields. Each area has additional workspace for support staff and student managers to accommodate program growth. Between the coach areas is a shared meeting room that will host full team meetings and study hall sessions throughout the school year.
The completion of this project caps a years-long effort to improve the facilities of two of CBU's winningest programs. The building is the final puzzle piece after installing outfield video boards ahead of the 2022 season, softball field turf installed in 2023, and the entire baseball field turf installed before the 2024 season. The building will be humming in May 2025 as the CBU campus is set to host the Western Athletic Conference Softball Tournament for the first time as part of the league.