Several things:
1. As 56 Bells said, parking was plentiful, but that might have been because we were playing Oregon State on a Friday afternoon, and OSU didn't bring a bunch of fans. Against home team DBU on a Saturday, I would expect a bunch more fans to show up, so I think getting to the ballpark early would be in order (even if rain IS forecast the two hours before first pitch).
2. Turns out that although the DBU seating chart still shows a berm for GA seating along right field yesterday, that area now has bleachers -- a bunch better than sitting on wet sod. But, although their website on Wednesday said that those GA seats would go on sale at 9:00 a.m. each day of the regional, DBU, in fact, put them on sale on their website the day after all the reserved seats had sold. If they ever host another regional, they REALLY need to get their act together re their ticketing process and communication.
3. O'Guinn Creek runs behind the right field fence at DBU's stadium. That creek overflowed overnight and that's where all the water on the field came from. A Dallas policeman told me that DBU had people out in the stadium doing cleanup work at 3:30 a.m. and that the helicopter had shown up at 8:30 a.m. It was literally hovering 2 feet from the turf as it dried off the field. The army of students with leaf blowers was sort of comical and sort of pathetic.
4. After a friend sent a blistering email to the 28-year old DBU AD (who apparently is spending a bunch more time pursuing his Doctor of Education in Higher Educational Leadership from TCU than he is on his job as DBU AD), they cleaned up several things including putting a note on their ticket website page indicating that one needs to register before trying to select tickets. The buzz around the ballpark was about why DBU didn't get a regional checklist from some other Texas school re the multitudinous details that need to be taken care of when hosting a regional. Clearly, DBU is in OJT mode re this regional thing. I've talked to lots of friends who tried to look for tickets on the DBU website on Wednesday, but because they had no idea one needed to register first, they spent lots of non-productive time on the site before figuring that out. And by then, the reserved seats were sold out.
5. Because I was coming from my relatives' home in the Rowlett area (NE Dallas suburb) and I-30 was flooded in at least one place near downtown Dallas, I circumvented that problem area by taking a 635/I-20 loop around the southern part of Dallas. No clue if that will be required on Saturday, but I'll probably just do that again since there was no real traffic delay issues on that route.
6. There are no fast food places along Mountain Creek Parkway from I-20 to DBU. I thought for sure that there would be at least ONE. But there wasn't. So, if you're coming in that way for today's game and want something other than a hot dog or a poor stringy BBQ sandwich at the ballpark, get it before you exit I-20. Or just take 408 off of I-20; there have got to be some places to get something along that route.
7. Relief pitching and clutch hitting failures downed the Horns. Got to get hits more often with two out and men on. The latter is the same mantra we've been chanting the whole year (or for several years now), though. The HR that Zane robbed from DBU and the 2-run blast that Marlow hit deep to right (Zane was on base as a result of a single, BTW) were the highlights of that game. I'll remember those two plays for a long time.
8. At 6:45 a.m., it's starting to rain HARD in Rowlett. Lord willing and if the creek don't rise . . . .
Last edited: May 30, 2015