Sarasota, Fla. — Because the day's schedule had been forever altered, the Eastern Mennonite University baseball team decided to go to a baseball game, if it couldn't play in one.

So it was on a gray Saturday afternoon, the EMU Royals settled into the grandstands at Ed Smith Stadium, where Cincinnati would play its Grapefruit League opener with Minnesota. For a moment, it was spring training after all.

Ben Gray/Staff (ENLARGE)

Eastern Mennonite University's Zach Polloni takes a photograph of a teammate while at a spring training game between the Reds and the Twins on Saturday afternoon in Sarasota. EMU was scheduled to play Bluffton University at that time.

Ben Gray/Staff (ENLARGE)

After finding out about the Bluffton University bus crash early Friday morning, Jameson Jarvis, a captain of the Eastern Mennonite University baseball team, took his hat off and found comfort in a favorite quote from Psalms that he had written on underside of the brim: 'Be still and know that I am God.'

Ben Gray/Staff (ENLARGE)

Bernie (left) and Dick Tranowski of Chicago bow their heads in a moment of silence for the Bluffton University baseball team before a spring training game between the Reds and the Twins in Sarasota on Saturday afternoon.

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Then public address announcer Art Ross called on the crowd to rise for a moment of silence to remember the fatal bus crash that had befallen the Bluffton University baseball team.

"Please pray for the families of those that died," Ross asked, "and for the recovery of the injured."

At that very minute, EMU was supposed to have been playing Bluffton at a crosstown high school field. Even in its diversion, the EMU team found sadness had followed it into the stands.

"At the same time, I don't want to get away from it," said EMU captain Jameson Jarvis, a third baseman. "They need to be in our thoughts and prayers every minute of the day. It's something you don't want to dwell on but at the same time, this should help show each and every individual we're not promised tomorrow."

"We're not promised 10 minutes from now."

Because the national Mennonite population is so small — 110,000 in the United States, 1 million worldwide — the news of the Bluffton tragedy came quickly to the EMU team with Friday's dawn. The team bus, having departed Harrisonburg, Va., the previous afternoon, happened to be in the same state (though near the Florida border) and on the same road at the same of the wreck.

Royals right fielder Zach Polloni phoned friends back at Bluffton to extend sympathy. School president Loren Swartzendruber dealt with an ultimate irony: Pastors from the five American Mennonite colleges were just heading home after a week of meetings at EMU. One of the topics had been "How do you manage a crisis."

"Our campus pastors actually provided the order of service and the readings that they used in a Bluffton [memorial service on Friday] evening," Swartzendruber said. "It was a way of saying to them, 'We want to walk with you.' . . . They actually had a phone line-up and did a prayer service together."

EMU had established a Mennonite baseball spring tournament in the early 1990s and Bluffton, after dropping out a few years ago, was coming back for a Saturday double-header before continuing to Fort Myers for the Gene Cusic Collegiate Classic.

Now, EMU athletics director Dave King was trying to schedule a Monday game with Hiram College, Bluffton's scheduled first-round opponent. The Royals would eventually work out late Saturday afternoon, before taking Sunday off. Mennonite schools do not play on Sundays, even if there may be peace on the field as well.

"It's a place to get away," Polloni said. "But you're still thinking about getting away."

Cincinnati's Ken Griffey Jr. had been asked for a souvenir for an injured Bluffton player and autographed a ball for pitcher Zack Arend, "Dear Zack, Get well fast." As if it could be that easy.

"Why are we so important that it wasn't us?" Jarvis asked, flipping over his cap to reveal "Psalms 46:10" printed under the bill.

Asked why he chose that passage, the third baseman recited, "Be still and know that I am God."