 The modest seating bowl and artificial turf surface of Illinois Field, Aug-2013. |
 A look at the playing field from behind home plate, an area well protected from foul balls. |
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The modest seating bowl and artificial turf surface of Illinois Field, Aug-2013. |
A look at the playing field from behind home plate, an area well protected from foul balls. |
The University of Illinois has produced some quality baseball talent over the years, most notably player-manager Lou Boudreau, who attended here in the 1930s and came up to the Cleveland Indians around the same time as Bob Feller. As a player-manager with the Tribe, he led the club to a World Series victory over the Boston Braves in 1948.
Illinois Field is located across the street and to the east of the Illini football stadium, near the border with the neighboring city of Urbana (the campus overlaps the cities). The park, which was recently outfitted with artificial turf, is otherwise a modest facility. Despite this, the fledgling and short-lived Great Central League, part of the first wave of the independent league revival of the 1990s, placed a team here for the 1994 season.