Every July, I venture off somewhere in this great country of ours to attend the Assemblies of God Teen Bible Quiz National Championships. I help run the tournament, which features 40 teams from across the nation who compete in an academic-bowl type of game whose subject material is the Bible.

The tournament has taken me to a wide variety of places, from Seattle to central Florida, Palm Springs to Valley Forge, and many places in between. In the process, I’ve seen sports events I’d never have seen in our area. I first saw lacrosse in Washington, D.C., years before it was ever played here. I also got to play duckpin bowling in Baltimore, which you’ll never see here.

This year’s event was in suburban Detroit. Frankly, I didn’t expect to see anything unusual there in terms of sports.

So on a trip afterward to Belle Isle, the city’s lovely park on an island in the Detroit River between downtown and Canada, I was truly astonished by what I encountered.

It wasn’t the unlimited hyroplane boat racing on one side of the island. No, I’ve seen that before, as one of that tour’s major events is held on the Ohio River, not far from my hometown.

But among the dozens of family reunion picnics and bikers and boat-race spectators and such was an open field, in the middle of which was a strip of artifical turf. At each end of the strip were sets of three wooden sticks. Two men with what look like flattened baseball bats stood near each set of sticks, and around them were 11 other men in matching uniforms, plus two more men in contrasting dress and brimmed hats.

I had stumbled across a game of — of all things — cricket. In downtown Detroit.

Yes, the ancient English game of cricket was being played in the Motor City.

For those unfamiliar with the game, here’s the Cliff’s Notes version: Cricket is played on an oval field, where a “bowler” (pitcher) throws a ball toward a batsman standing in front of a wicket (the wooden sticks). The batsman tries to hit the ball far enough away so that he and his partner by the other wicket can exchange places one or more times to score. The bowler is trying to knock down the wicket to get the batsman out. In its traditional form, the game goes on for days; this was a shortened “one-day” version.

At one time was the most popular team sport in the United States, before baseball surpassed it. In fact, the very first international test match was the USA against England, back in the 1800s.

I was taught the game by an evangelist friend from Wales. He claimed to have played at the county level in England, roughly equivalent to Major League Baseball here. I don’t know why cricket has fascinated me — probably just trying to figure out its peculiarities.

So why was it being played in Motown?

Well, there’s a huge immigrant population there, attracted years ago by the auto industry. Among them are many from India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh, where cricket is huge.

The players in this match, who were astonished to see a redneck from Alabama come there way (particularly one who actually knew a wee bit about the sport), said there were roughly two dozen teams in southern Michigan in a league.

I’ve always wanted to see cricket played live, but I never thought I would get the chance. I thought I’d have to go to England or the West Indies to see it in person.

Unfortunately, the match ended soon after I arrived, called off because a player had been notified of a death in the family. The other players decided to stop the match. It’s a gentleman’s sport, after all, where poor conduct is reprimanded by the simple saying, “That’s not cricket.”

I’m still scratching my head at the thought of a game from England being played by Indians and Paks, in the United States, on an island where the field’s backdrop was a group of high-rise apartment buildings in Canada.

And being watched by a redneck.