Big Hope
- Updated: February 10, 2025
Celebrating two years of work at Oxford’s Big Jack Stovall Sports Complex, Hope Christian Academy’s Burns cuts the ribbon on its sports home.
By Joe Medley
East Alabama Sports Today
OXFORD — Sun broke through a small cloud hole over Hope Christian Academy’s new baseball field Monday, just ahead of the ribbon cutting at Big Jack Stovall Sports Complex.
It was as if God’s a showman.
The 2-year-old school’s sports present and future showed out in the form of grass, dirt, steel and a splash of purple and gold, all around the leased and repurposed complex.
Just ahead of a forecasted week’s worth of rain, sun broke through to shine on the crowd of Hope baseball players, coaches, parents, Hope head of school Nic Burns and Oxford city officials as they marked the day.
“I just want to thank everybody that’s put into this,” Jackie Stovall, the son of the late “Big Jack” Stovall, told the gathering. “It’s amazing, from what it was two years ago to what it is now.
“My dad would be so proud. I know he’s smiling down.”
Hope Christian Academy, based in the old Grace Baptist Church building, in Oxford, has 140 students from pre-K through 12th grade. Burns said he expects the school to soon reach its 200-student capacity for the current building.
“We have a new building coming out back of our facility now,” Burns said. “It’ll be a little while out. It won’t be for this school year, but we got the approval to start building on it.”
Hope Christian Academy’s inaugural varsity baseball season starts Monday. The Saints will play Evangel Christian on the new field at the Big Jack.
The school’s sports offerings for the current school year include cross country, volleyball, varsity and junior varsity basketball and baseball. For the 2025-26 school year, school officials plan to add 11-man football, girls’ basketball and softball.
The school plays under the Alabama Independent Schools Association umbrella.
The renovated Big Jack Stovall Sports Complex, leased by the school, includes the baseball field, which is near completion, and football field. Earth work has been done on the softball field, which will be situated next to the baseball field and behind the concessions building.
The new purple-and-gold road sign greets drivers on Airport Road. The concessions buildings and press boxes are gold at the bottom, purple up top.
Oxford mayor Alton Craft said interests representing Hope Christian Academy funded work done at the complex.
“We worked with the city to lease this property from them and to be able to do our fields here,” Burns said. “They were great, outstanding, working with us. They allowed us to come in and do a lot of the work. …
“There were already the concessions stands and press boxes here. We were able to come in and renovate them. We started from the bottom, and here it is.”
Burns said funding came from interests representing the school.
“Our ministry just really poured into it and was able to work with a bunch of different people,” he said. “They were able to assist us in it.”
Hope’s baseball team has attracted interest after the hiring of Top Gun Athletic owner Roby Brooks as head coach. Brooks also serves as general manager for the Choccolocco Monsters, Oxford’s summer Sunbelt League wood-bat team for college players.
Brooks called Monday’s ribbon cutting “just unbelievable.”
“Just the Stovalls and having everybody out here, it’s an honor to play under his name,” Brooks said. “Every time we come out there, we talk about him and how we’re going to try to play the game and how he would want it to be played.
“Like his son said, I mean, look at this place. Two years ago, it was almost done for, and not it’s one of the best facilities around, super-dooper nice. We couldn’t be more blessed.”
The baseball team’s roster includes Eli Bozeman, who transferred from Oxford, and Aziah Amberson, who transferred from Wellborn after the 2024 football season.
“I’m very proud to be part of the first baseball team at Hope Christian,” Amberson said. “I’m very excited for this season.”
Both players wore Top Gun caps to practice Monday and said the chance to play for Brooks helped to draw them to Hope. Bozeman also likes being on the ground floor of the school’s sports future.
“Just the opportunity to put a team on the map,” he said. “It’s early in this school. It’s a new beginning, and it’s a lot of potential.
“We’ve got some good coaches here who are willing to put in a lot of time with our players.”
Video by Joe Medley/East Alabama Sports Today
Photos by Joe Medley/East Alabama Sports Today
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