D3baseball.com Daily Dose

For those of you in the warmer climates of the states, you are mostly immune to effects of February snows and general nasties in weather you do. However, around the middle of the country, from Alabama to Minnesota and Colorado to Ohio (and points further east with each passing hour) we are in the midst of an unusual amount of snow, rain, ice and other atmospheric phenomena. For those of you who have had the misfortune of experiencing this weather, I’m sorry.

But it is now nearing 5:00 PM in Minneapolis. I am sitting in the press box for the Metrodome and the air is a balmy… well, I’ll put it this way: I walked in through Gate F and my glasses were fine. When I walked into the press box, they fogged up. If I wasn’t suffering from cabin fever after -20 tempratures a month ago or the 11 inches of snow we got last weekend that hampered my ability to make a 85-mile drive in under two hours, I definitely am now.

Back to the miracles of “modern” engineering.

I’d say it’s at least 80 inside the stadium. And no snow. No rain. No ice. Just some loyal fans of Division III baseball, a team from St. Paul and one from Hancock, Mich. I’ve been here at the Dome for high school football, MIAC and UMAC football and dozens (if not hundreds) Twins games but there is nothing more daunting than to be on the field and be surrounded by a sea of blue.

Welcome to March in Minnesota. The snow piles up outside and the rabid baseball fans come into the Dome a wide variety of baseball: from preps to Division I to Division III. As I write this the University of Minnesota is taking practice on the field.

I tend to ramble on so I will try to summarize as much as I can. I’ll be here from time to time over the next few weeks as the basketball season winds down. Some of the key divisional matchups coming up in the next week include St. Thomas vs UW-Stevens Point on Monday evening, March 5 at 5PM (central). On Wednesday, St. Thomas will match up against Division I Minnesota at 6:30.

We’ll be here and there across the Division III country all week and through the end of the month. After each game I shoot here, look for the photos in the Photo Galleries.