Wright State approved the purchase of artificial turf for Nischwitz Stadium on Wednesday, an upgrade that keeps the baseball field among the elite facilities in the Midwest.

The turf will cost $1 million, and $600,000 of that comes from private fundraising. There were several donations of $100,000 or more from prominent alumni.

Construction has already begun and is scheduled to be completed by October.

“It’s big for the program and obviously big for the school,” WSU baseball coach Rob Cooper said. “It’s going to give us more developmental time with the players. It’s going to allow us to play more home games, which means less missed class time.”

Installing turf will save Wright State money in the long run, Athletic Director Bob Grant said, because it reduces maintenance costs.

“We’ve had drainage issues for several seasons,” Grant said. “There were games last season when our softball team was playing but we were rained out at Nischwitz because of standing water in the field, and it hadn’t rained for two or three days.”

Kent State, Cincinnati and Ohio State are among the colleges in Ohio with turf fields. In the Horizon League, llinois-Chicago has turf.

Grant said they are also buidling a new press box for Nischwitz, and that should be ready by late October.

“This catapults Nischwitz back to the crown jewel of the conference, of Southwest Ohio, of the region,” Grant said. “We’re a 44-year-old institution, so when it comes to facilities, I think we’re a little bit different. We take them seriously. We’re forming what’s going to be here for decades to come, for generations to follow.”

Nischwitz opened in 2000. It is named after Ron Nischwitz, who coached the program for 30 years, and his son Gregg, a former Wright State player who died in a construction accident in 1980.