RUSTON -- Look no further than the baseball, softball, soccer and tennis courts on Louisiana Tech's campus to understand the magnitude of the aftermath of the tornado that smashed through campus early Thursday morning.

While the core academic buildings, as well as shockingly the multiple dormitories that neighbors the the baseball and softball fields were nearly untouched, baseball stadium J.C. Love Field at Pat Patterson Park, the Louisiana Tech Softball and Soccer Complexes and the tennis courts suffered catastrophic damage.

"Baseball, softball, soccer (fields), tennis (courts) all of those are devastated," Tech Athletic Director Tommy McClelland told media members Thursday after assessing the damage. "

"It's devastating. It's a total rebuild for us."

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His rough, initial estimate of the cost of the destruction of the four athletic facilities was in the range of "millions (of dollars)."

Outfield fence demolished, light poles snapped

"This is not something we went to sleep last night thinking we'd be dealing with. But we've been overwhelmed by the support of the Tech family, the Ruston community and those that have reached out. That extends into the athletics community," McClelland said. "We've had people reach out to help, and quite frankly I don't know how to answer that question yet. There'll be a day and time when we can answer that but right now it's about making the campus safe and beginning the process of cleaning up and rebuild."

Story continues below video of tornado damage

The Tech softball and soccer stadiums took the brunt of the force from Thursday's storm. At the softball complex, the entire outfield fence was demolished and the scoreboard had a hole ripped through it. The bullpen along the right field fence and and batting cages behind the home team dugout were destroyed. Trees fell onto the stands and on top of the press box and multiple light poles snapped and were lying on the artificial turf.

Adjacent to the softball stadium, the soccer field barely looks recognizable as the stands were nearly wiped out while the scoreboard, team benches and both goals were moved down. The natural grass surface sustained debris and water damage.

McClelland categorized the Love Shack as the "most dangerous" area on campus and urged people to stay away from the structure. The concrete overhang partially collapsed in two separate spots falling into the stands, damaging many seats as well as lifted into the intersection of Alabama and Tech Drive. The outfield wall, running from left center to right center, including the tall center field wall, was completely blown way and the scoreboard beyond the rightfield fence is a total loss. The batting cages suffered some wind damage but appears to be salvageable.

The fencing around the tennis courts became mangled from the storm and there were several trees and other types of debris thrown onto the playing surfaces.

"Long-term for us, we got to look at what do we do? How to we rebuild the right way? It's difficult to say if I had -- if we had the money appropriated right now for these facilities, I don't know if we have them built in nine months," McClelland said. "That begins the question of we need to be preparing ourselves for the fact that we might not play softball, baseball, certainly soccer at these facilities for next year. What does that look like and how do we do that?"

Timing of Thursday's tornado caused more than physical structural damage. Louisiana Tech softball and baseball programs have been uprooted from their facility homes for the remainder of their respective home games this season, meaning both teams won't get to celebrate Senior Days at their own stadiums or have a place to practice

ROLLING STORM DAMAGE REPORTS: A storm damage reports database shows tornadoes, large hails and high winds in the U.S. during the last 24 hours.

The Lady Techsters are scheduled to host Western Kentucky this weekend for its final Conference USA home series of the regular season. McClelland said that the athletic department is working hard to ensure that the team will get to play their games this year locally and are looking at playing the WKU series at either Cedar Creek School or Ruston High.

"It's definitely really depressing," Techster senior softball player Berkley Calapp said of the damage to the softball field. "With Senior weekend this weekend, I didn't realize my last game on the field was going to be a midweek [game versus Louisiana-Lafayette Wednesday night]. It's sad."

Baseball's final home series versus WKU, too, the weekend of May 10-12. With the games being more than two weeks away, McClelland said its gives Tech ample time to put a contingency plan in place. Right now, playing the games and practicing at either neighbor Grambling State or possibly Louisiana-Monroe 30 miles up I-20.

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In the wake of the storm, several football, softball players as well as other student-athletes and regular Louisiana Tech students were seen helping in the clean up efforts around campus.

"It's not organized," Tech head football coach Skip Holtz said. "Everybody's just kind of gotten up, gotten out on their own and said ,'what can we do to help?' and starting to clean up. I'm sure there's more things that we're going to be able to do, but it's pretty neat. One of our players, I told him it was great to see him out here and he said, 'coach this is our school.'

"I think that's the true spirit of Louisiana Tech and the Tech family," Lady Techsters basketball coach Brooke Stoehr said. "People talk about that, you can't quantify that, but you see that in times like this where we all pull together whether you're football, men's basketball, women's basketball or softball, we're all in this together. And we're all on the same team."

While the tornado ripped up athletic facilities on campus and financial and logistical nightmares, the fact that no students or student-athletes were harmed, providing a little hope, Tech head football coach Skip Holtz and women's basketball coach Brooke Stoehr said, in the wake of the devastation.

"When you look at the destruction that this storm left in it path here in Ruston from trees, facilities, buildings, the power of the storm it's been unbelievable. You say your prayers and blessings that the injuries, how fortunate we are that it went through a tennis court and not a dorm building where there were hundreds of students sleeping last night," Holtz said. "I don't want to say blessed because there's a lot of destruction, but we're blessed.

"Our biggest concern is the safety of the student because they're under out care, all of them on campus," Stoehr said. "I'm so grateful and thankful that they're OK. We know that buildings and facilities can be repaired. We're just thankful that there's not a lot more damage to lives."

Those interested in contributing to the disaster relief efforts can do so online at ltu.al/disasterrelief.

Stay tuned as this story will be updated.

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