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Carroll B. Land Stadium
Learn more about Carroll B. Land, whom the field is named after.
Nestled on the seaside cliffs of Point Loma, overlooking the Pacific Ocean, no other collegiate baseball park can match the picturesque views and comfortable setting of Carroll B. Land Stadium. Coaches, players, and fans marvel at the beautiful park and the magnificent surroundings. The immaculate green grass of the playing field is outlined by the blue sky and sea. Its cozy dimensions offset by the prevailing winds blowing in off the ocean.
In 1993, Kevin Kernan of the San Diego Union-Tribune was on the Point Loma Nazarene campus covering the NAIA Volleyball tournament. Walking beyond the gym, he was amazed upon viewing the university’s spectacular baseball field.
Charmed by the baseball facility, Kernan wrote an article that appeared in both the local Union-Tribune and the national Baseball America magazine. The title of the article, “America’s Most Scenic Ballpark.” The nickname has stuck ever since. However, the ballpark wasn’t always “America’s Most Scenic.”
Before moving to San Diego, Pasadena College did not have an on-campus baseball facility at all. The team played its home games at Arcadia Park, Victory Park and Brookside Park in Arroyo Seco. After relocating to Point Loma in 1973, the college took over the present campus from Cal Western-USIU, inheriting the school’s ballpark. It was the first time in his 12 years of coaching the team that Land enjoyed an on-site baseball field.
Since the 1970s, Carroll B. Land Stadium has seen numerous improvements including the the six-foot high “dug-ups” were replaced with field-level dugouts and the addition of a concession stand and restrooms in the 1980s along with a chain-link fence was replacing a wooden one. Throughout the 1990s, the stadium continued to be refined. A new scoreboard was added, seats were brought in to replace the concrete benches, and a club-view seating box over the home dugout was built.
In the 2010s, over 300 new seats, which were previously in Petco Park, were brought in to replace the previous seats and the scoreboard was also replaced following a severe windstorm. The artificial turf was also extended from the end of each dugout to cover behind home plate, and the infield and outfield grass was replaced in 2017. A new digital scoreboard was installed, along with the addition of padding to the outfield fence.
Fittingly, in 1998, the park was named Carroll B. Land Stadium in honor of the school’s athletic director and 39-year baseball coach whose dedication and hard work over the years transformed the park from a literal diamond in the rough into the gem it is today.
