There have been a number of shootings impacting sports lately. The most recent came Saturday, and came during an actual game. It happened when a NAIA baseball game between the University of Houston-Victoria Jaguars and the Texas A&M-Texarkana Eagles at the Eagles’ George Dobson Field was suspended in the fifth inning following nearby shots, one of which hit a player.
In the Eagles’ bullpen, an 18-year-old Eagles’ player was struck in the chest by one of those shots. He was rushed to hospital for surgery. Fortunately, as per the Eagles’ athletics department, he was in stable condition as of Saturday night:
Official statement from @TAMUTexarkana on today’s incident. pic.twitter.com/sDnhhylD6S
— TAMUT Athletics (@TAMUT_Athletics) April 30, 2023
Stevon Gamble of The Texarkana Gazette has more on this, including comments from Texarkana Texas Police Department spokesman Shawn Vaughn:
The player was taken to a local hospital for emergency surgery.
Vaughn said it does not appear anyone was the target of the shooting. The stray bullet seems to have been fired from a neighborhood near the ballfield.
“Incredibly bad luck, bad place,” Vaughn said.
Around the time of the shooting, police were alerted to shots being fired from cars traveling through a nearby neighborhood, Vaughn said.
Gamble writes that the park was also filled with hundreds of Boy Scouts, who planned to camp out for the annual Scout-O-Rama. That was called off after the shooting. The baseball game, which the Jaguars were leading 7-4 when it was suspended, was officially declared a no-contest Sunday, and the Eagles also cancelled their planned softball games Sunday.
Due to the events surrounding yesterday's baseball game, the decision was made to cancel today's softball doubleheader at LSUA. | #GoEagles pic.twitter.com/8RNa1gj7GK
— TAMUT Athletics (@TAMUT_Athletics) April 30, 2023
Saturday’s baseball game vs UHV has been declared a “no contest” by the Red River Athletic Conference. | #GoEagles pic.twitter.com/19cQDR3Tic
— TAMUT Athletics (@TAMUT_Athletics) April 30, 2023
This is only the latest shooting to impact college sports. It comes just two weeks after a Jacksonville State football recruit was one of four people killed during a shooting at a birthday party in Dadeville, Alabama.
[The Texarkana Gazette; image from KTBS]
