Highland High School breaks ground on new baseball stadium

POCATELLO, Idaho (KIFI) - Highland High School broke ground on its new varsity baseball stadium on Wednesday. District 25 says the vision of the new field came from varsity baseball coach Christian Colonel.

He says he originally pitched his vision for a new field with a sketch he drew with crayons.

"All along, I've envisioned students coming out of school at 4:00 or 342 and grabbing their activity card and coming out here and grabbing a hot dog and watching a ballgame and not having to drive off campus for a game," Colonel said. "Right now, we're sharing Halliwell with a couple of other schools. And not a lot of kids make it for the game. They say they're going to come, but they don't always make it."

While other schools in the Pocatello area are building new sports stadiums, that wasn't always the case for Highland's baseball field.

"His baseball facility wasn't part of our five-year plan," District 25 Athletic Director Tonya Wilkes said. "So he reached out to Westmark credit union and said, 'hey, can you help? You know, sponsor and put in some groundwork with my baseball field'."

And Westmark jumped at the opportunity, donating $250,000 to cover the cost of most of the upgrades.

With Westmark and District 25's help, Colonel's plans have come a long way from the stadium he drew in crayons. Now they've broken ground on the stadium he says the team can take pride in.

"Having a field on campus is a big deal for our kids, and it's going to be a lot of fun for our school and our community," Colonel said.

District 25 expects the stadium will be ready for the next spring season.