The Rural Roots Baseball Classic takes place Sunday in Oyen, Alberta. (Photo: WCBL)

By Josh Hall

Gulls and Bulls to duel in WCBL Rural Roots Baseball Classic Sunday in Oyen

Jun 6, 2025 | 12:02 PM

The Sylvan Lake Gulls continue their young 2025 WCBL season this weekend with the inaugural Rural Roots Baseball Classic.

The event, which pits the Gulls against the Lethbridge Bulls, goes down at Doug Lehman Field in Oyen, with first pitch at 3:30.

“We are very excited for the Rural Roots Baseball Classic. This is our version of Major League Baseball’s Field of Dreams game that they hold in Iowa,” WCBL President Kevin Kvame said.

“We’re going to try to move it around each year to a historical baseball location in our footprint and put on a regular-season WCBL game with two of our franchises. We’re excited to start in Oyen with a big community festival that will salute the Pronghorns.”

According to the WCBL, the Pronghorns became the first team from Alberta to win a title in the SMBL and opened the door for the Lethbridge Bulls to join the league in 1999, transforming the circuit to the Western Major Baseball League (WMBL) in 2002 until it was rebranded into the current WCBL in 2018.

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The Pronghorns helped elevate the league into a two-province entity that represented the growing baseball communities of Alberta and Saskatchewan.

As it turns out, there are strong ties between the two franchises.

Aqil Samuel, Gulls president, had the first at-bat for the Pronghorns when they joined the SMBL.

“My two summers in Oyen were great. I was still in high school but got a chance to play in the Saskatchewan Major Baseball League. Oyen actually became a bit of a second home for me for years, and I still have some great friends in the area. To be part of this league all these years later is pretty special and I can’t wait to go back,” said Samuel.

“Bringing the Gulls back to Oyen to play the Bulls is going to be fun. Oyen is such a baseball town … it is going to be a great atmosphere and I know it is going to be well supported by the entire community.”

Meantime, Graham Schetzsel, founder & CEO of the Gulls, played first base on the 1995 championship team alongside Todd Hubka, who was the first head coach of the Lethbridge Bulls.

Further, Oyen Mayor Doug Jones is past-president of the WCBL and member of the Red Deer-based Alberta Sports Hall of Fame which helped establish the Badlands Baseball Academy.

Sylvan Lake is 4-2 so far this season, and Lethbridge is 2-3, with both teams in the West Division.

The Gulls are home to Okotoks tonight at 7:05, then play Okotoks again tomorrow on the road before a date with Lethbridge at their regular home diamond, Spitz Field in Lethbridge, all before the rematch on Sunday in Oyen. Lethbridge, meanwhile, is home to Energy City tonight and tomorrow, also 7:05 starts, before game one against Sylvan on Saturday, and again, the Classic on Sunday.

Tickets for the Rural Roots Baseball Classic are available through the Lethbridge Bulls website.

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