Rosenblatt Stadium, Omaha, Nebraska

Bruce Henrickson sits with his two sons in the left-field bleachers at Rosenblatt Stadium on a beautiful June afternoon.

The three of them sit only 10 rows from the field, drinking in the University of Texas and University of Florida players warming up beneath them. Fans dressed in Longhorn burnt orange and Gator blue and orange fill in the seats around them, cheering on their players and teams.

In a few hours, Game 1 of the Div. I college baseball national championship will begin – and for the fourth time, Henrickson and his family have traveled from Grayslake, Ill., to Omaha, Neb., and paid only $8.50 to attend.

The national championship caps off the two-week event known as the College World Series, an eight-team tournament played every June.

“Rosenblatt comes close to echoing Wrigley Field,” Henrickson said. “The competition, the people and the atmosphere is what makes it great. I would be really upset if they ever moved the tournament from Rosenblatt.”

Over the past few years, Henrickson’s sons have chased batting practice home-run balls, met the 2004 national champion University of California St.-Fullerton players and held the CWS-winning trophy – but this day will yield a new memory.

When he leaves the game later that night, one of his sons will have the souvenir neatly tucked inside his baseball glove.

“Catching the home run ball made our [admission] worth it,” Henrickson said. “That’s a memory that’s going to last forever.”

"The Best All-Around Sporting Event in the Country"

Like Augusta National Golf Club, the Rose Bowl and Wrigley Field, Rosenblatt Stadium – characterized by its gigantic blue facade and pillars and white sign that reads, “OMAHA’S ROSENBLATT STADIUM” – is an American sports icon.

Built in 1948, Rosenblatt is the home of the Omaha Royals, the Triple-A affiliate of the Kansas City Royals, for 50 weeks every year.

The other two weeks – the 14 days in June when the College World Series arrives – yield some of the country’s best baseball, including doubleheaders and games that are decided on the last pitch.

Greg Pivovar, owner of a sports memorabilia shop across the street from Rosenblatt, remembers the best day of baseball he ever has seen. It was June 21, 2005, a day that yielded 8-7 games between the University of Nebraska and Arizona State University and Baylor University and Tulane University.

Unlike Pivovar, Nebraska native Nick Boggy can’t choose his most famous College World Series moment. With the back of Rosenblatt’s left-field stands hovering in the background, Boggy sits in Dingerville, the stadium’s main parking lot that overflows with RVs and trailers.

Underneath a huge red-and-white University of Nebraska umbrella that reads, “HUSKERS,” Boggy puts down his drink and turns to his three friends as he searches for an answer. It’s a hard question for him, as he started coming to the College World Series in 1962.

“I have a love for the CWS,” he said. “I started coming here when I was 10 years old. I just have always known that when June comes around, it’s time to go to Omaha.”

For individual performances, he selects Warren Morris’ two-out home run to win the 1997 CWS for Louisiana State University.

He also recalls future Hall of Famer Roger Clemens’ throwing for Texas in the early 1980s and Ohio State University’s Steve Arlin’s delivering one of the all-time greatest pitching performances in the mid-’60s.

Boggy said thrilling moments include CWS games that featured nearby schools Creighton University and the University of Nebraska.

More than the games and the players, Boggy also loves the camaraderie and tradition.

“It’s just like Olde Home week,” he said. “We’ve sat next to the same people for ‘x’ number of years. We get caught up with each other’s families and developments in their lives.”

Boggy said the CWS is one of the best events he ever has attended.

“For a one-day event, the best sporting event is the Indianapolis 500,” he said. “But for a 10-day event, the CWS is it. Players play here for a little scholarship and for the love of the game. It’s the best all-around event in the country.”

An American Tradition

Zesto’s, a popular restaurant a block from Rosenblatt, is packed, selling its burgers and malts for less than $10. The smell of burgers, brats and rawhide fills the 30 shops and tents that dot the landscape, selling newspapers, memorabilia, baseball equipment and T-shirts.

Harry Minard of Shreveport, La., walks down the street, stopping at shops from time to time. He’s wearing a CWS shirt that reads “LSU: 1993 National Champions.”

“The CWS is baseball at its purest,” he said. “There’s a lot better access to the players for autographs, and everyone is interested and involved in the game. It’s like going to watch a minor league game with a Major League Baseball playoff feel.”

Minard only has been to Rosenblatt a few times, but he calls it the essence of the United States.

“This is Americana,” he said. “It may not be as big as college football or basketball, but it’s still America’s sport, and it’s still a great game.”

Finding a Ticket -- No Problem

The line is one of the CWS’s traditions.

The ticket organizers sell reserved tickets for most of Rosenblatt’s seats. The other seats – the bleachers in the outfield – are general admission on a first-come, first-served basis. These tickets cost less than $10, but fans must wait in line for three to six hours.

Other sporting events usually have corporations scooping up tickets weeks or even months in advance, but the CWS keeps some bleacher seats available for game days. Sometimes, when nearby teams play at Rosenblatt, the line for general admission tickets gets so long that the stadium has to turn people away.

“When Nebraska played here, they had to turn away 2,000 people,” Boggy said.

The fans love the line, passing time by reading the newspaper, talking to friends, tailgating, taking naps on the grass in perfect summer weather or playing catch.

Today, because Texas is playing for the title, the crowd is a sea of burnt orange. Men have their chests painted with large T’s or the Longhorn logo, women have mini-Longhorns on their cheeks and seemingly every fan wears an orange-and-white Texas T-shirt.

Sixty-seven-year-old Vernon West, a native of North Platte, Neb., is attending his second CWS with his wife, but he doesn’t mind the wait to get inside.

“It’s not a pain in the rear,” he said. “You get to meet and talk to people. We stayed with the same people this year that we did back in 1997.”

West would rather watch a college game at Rosenblatt than a major league contest.

“I like it a lot better than Turner Field, [the home of the Atlanta Braves],” he said. “The pros play for money and have a different attitude than the college players.”

After nearly four hours in line, West and his wife arrive inside the stadium. Behind them snakes a line hundreds of people long – all clamoring for a chance to pay a small sum to watch one of the greatest sporting events in the country.

The National Championship

It’s worth the wait.

Rosenblatt on a June day is one of the most idyllic scenes in baseball. The field is perfectly immaculate. Red, white and blue bunting drapes the press box and the area behind home plate, and the stadium is beyond capacity.

It only is supposed to fit 20,000 – but 25,958 watch the game.

The bleachers are the best place to sit because of the collegiate atmosphere and the constant cheering. Everyone is packed in like sardines, but the fans just are happy to be here.

“I really don’t mind the bleacher seats,” Craig Arnett, of Iowa City, Iowa, said. “There’s always plenty of room.”

Before the afternoon game starts, every player from both teams throws a baseball into the stands – a scene no one will see in any Major League Baseball game.

One player doesn’t throw his ball. Instead he walks to the wall and places his ball in the glove of a young boy.

The boy turns and runs back to his parents, grinning from ear to ear with a smile usually reserved for Christmas morning.

The game takes on the same intensity as a college football contest. When Texas manager Augie Garrido walks by the bleachers and flashes the “Hook-em Horns” sign with his index and pinkie fingers pointed toward the sky, the Longhorn faithful yell, “We love you, Augie!” When Texas scores the first run of the game, the right-field bleachers yell, “Texas!” and the left field screams, “Fight!”

When Florida makes a big play, Gator fans start the Gator Chomp, a clap in which fans extend one arm above the head and the other to the knees and then bring the hands together. Fans continue to show support for hours, before fireballing Longhorns closer J. Brent Cox saves a 4-2 victory.

As 11 p.m. creeps near, a few Texas fans unfurl a huge banner with a burnt orange Longhorn. They hold it up for a few minutes and then join the rest of the crowd exiting Rosenblatt – a crowd that just witnessed a day of baseball that yielded lifetime memories.

Photos by John Brockman