George Fox University soccer, baseball, and softball teams have played home games on the three playing fields that comprise the Curtis and Margaret Morse Athletic Fields complex since 1989.
Located across from the Wheeler Sports Center on Fulton Street and Villa Road on the northeast corner of the campus, the complex was renovated using a major donation from Curtis and Margaret Morse, avid supporters of Bruin athletics. The Morse family has had a long association with George Fox, four generations of the family having attended the Newberg school.
All three Morse fields are natural-grass surfaces. The soccer field, home to both the men's and women's soccer teams, has temporary bleachers scattered around the field for seating up to 250 spectators, with plenty of standing room along the sidelines and end lines as well. An electronic scoreboard is located in the southwest corner.
The Morse baseball field has temporary bleachers for 250 and a full-scale electronic scoreboard in right field, while the Morse softball field has seating for 100 fans and a small electronic scoreboard on top of the third base dugout.
Fund-raising efforts are now under way for a further renovation of the Morse Athletic Fields that will eventually result in new surfaces for the fields, increased and improved seating, and lights for night games, placing the Bruins' home facilities among the best in the nation at the Division III level.
Entered by crossing a wooded canyon on a 200-foot-long bridge, the Coleman H. Wheeler Sports Center, home of the George Fox Bruins volleyball and men's and women's basketball teams, is a natural environment for sports.
The sports center was designed by noted architect Pietro Belluschi to sit unpretentiously alongside tree-shaded Hess Creek canyon. Built using gifts from prominent lumbermen, the building features a two-level oak parquet lobby and a large window area overlooking the adjacent natural terrain.
Completed in June 1977, the $2.7 million, 55,000-square-foot complex is the university’s largest building. It contains the James and Lila Miller Gymnasium, the Bruins home court, with a total seating capacity of 2,750.
The Wheeler Sports Center features a 116- by 174-foot gymnasium with three full-length basketball courts, three volleyball courts, and 10 badminton courts. The ceilings are 32 feet above the hardwood maple floor.
The building may be entered on two levels. The east-side ground level is accessible from the parking lot by crossing the footbridge. The on-campus community enters on the west-side second floor.
Contained on the upper level are a staff room, multipurpose room, classrooms, and athletics administration and faculty offices. A 1,500-square-foot weight room was remodeled in the summer of 1993. The lower level contains a concession area, dressing rooms, team rooms, laundry, equipment-issuing room, and storage space. An east wing of the building houses two racquetball courts.
The center is named for long-time Oregon lumberman Coleman H. Wheeler, former chairman of the board of Willamette Industries. The gymnasium is named for James Miller, former George Fox board member and president of Cascadia Lumber Co., and his wife, Lila.