The War Memorial Stadium was home to the Buffalo Bisons until 1987. Decades later, the venue has a new purpose and look.

Saturday marked a new beginning for the historic baseball field.

When the Bisons moved downtown, the site became a home for high school sports. Johnnie B. Wiley Stadium underwent extensive renovations, including new sodding, dugouts, a scoreboard and sound system.

“This is the first baseball game I've seen on this site in 32 years,” said former Bisons General Manager, Mike Billoni. "I am so happy because we were part of the discussion of renovating the old stadium."

When the Bisons’ former owner Bob Rich passed away, he left specific instructions for the team to adopt city high school baseball. A substantial cash donation paid for renovations, new equipment for the program and stipends for assistant coaches.

"Baseball needs more city kids playing baseball.  It's one of the things overall we're losing participation in our sport,” said Bisons General Manager, Mike Buczkowski. “We need to market better to city kids so we thought overall this we be a great way to give them a great experience to play here and to practice here but maybe someone can get to college because they're a pretty good baseball player."

The kids were invited to Sahlen Field for batting practice, where each school will also play a game.

"I'm going to love playing here for the next two years for sure,” City Honors sophomore, Matthew Cambria said.