Rutgers: Kristen Butler, who was hired at Rutgers after coming over from Toledo in June, will be assisted by some familiar faces, as she brought her Rockets coaching staff with her. Assistant coaches Rod Radcliffe and Brandon Duncan will join the Scarlet Knights and occupy similar roles to what they had at Toledo. The group was named the Mid-American Conference Coaching Staff of the Year in 2018. Radcliffe was previously the head coach at Bethel University in Minnesota and is the program’s hitting and outfield coach. Duncan coached with Butler when both were assistants at Charleston Southern; also a former…
Author: jmcleod
Kentucky has signed head coach Rachel Lawson to a contract extension that will keep her in Lexington through the 2023 season. Lawson had signed a contract extension in the summer of 2017, but reportedly garnered interest from Oregon and Texas for their then-vacant head coaching positions this offseason. The contract, which JWOS viewed a copy of, allots Lawson a $300,000 base salary. That number moves her into the upper echelon of head coaching salaries in Division I. The contract also includes non-cumulative incentive bonuses for an SEC regular-season championship; SEC tournament championship; Super Regional appearance; Women’s College World Series appearance;…
Eight teams will take the field on July 23rd in Utrecht, Netherlands, all with the same objective: Qualifying for the 2020 Olympic Games in Tokyo, Japan. Two of the teams will be representing African nations, while the remaining six come from the European continent. Only one team will reach the exclusive field that will vie for a medal next year in Tokyo. No team enters the tournament hotter than the Italian national squad. The winners of the European Championship that took place in the Czech Republic in early July, the Italians thrived on the home run ball and dominated opponents…
ESPN has signed Laura Rutledge to a multi-year contract extension, the network announced on Tuesday. Rutledge covers a variety of sports across the ESPN platform of networks, including the Women’s College World Series. For the last several years, she has teamed with play-by-play broadcaster Adam Amin and color commentator Amanda Scarborough to form the broadcast team for daytime games at the WCWS. Thanks to the trio’s rising popularity, at the 2018 tournament, Rutledge; Amin; and Scarborough, along with Kayla Braud, co-hosted an alternate broadcast of the WCWS championship series that was seen on WatchESPN and ESPNU. The quartet interviewed guests,…
Mike White has filled out his full-time staff at Texas, adding Kerry Shaw as his second assistant and hitting coach. Shaw had been the head coach at Division II University of Mary for the past three seasons, leading the Marauders to a 55-87 win-loss record during his tenure. The squad posted a 34-49 mark in Northern Sun Intercollegiate Conference play under Shaw. Prior to joining the Marauders, Shaw spent the 2015 season as an assistant coach at Southeast Missouri State. His resume also includes more than two decades of coaching experience at the high school, American Legion, and similar levels of…
Jennifer Rocha is the new associate head coach at Oklahoma, the school announced on Wednesday. She will be the Sooners’ pitching coach. Rocha joins the Sooners, her alma mater, and will take the position vacated by Melyssa Lombardi, who accepted the head coaching position at Oregon last week. Rocha spent the past thirteen years on the staff at Florida, helping the Gators to back-to-back National Championships in 2014 and 2015. She earned the title of Associate Head Coach with the Gators in 2017. During her tenure in Gainesville, Rocha shepherded such heralded hurlers like Hannah Rogers, Lauren Haeger, Kelly Barnhill,…
Who is she? Tiffany McDonald, a former all-star pitcher for the Florida State Seminoles. What is she known for? McDonald played for the Noles from 2005-08. She was named the ACC Freshman of the Year in ’05 and set a conference and program single-season record with more than 329 innings of work in her sophomore season. She twice earned all-conference honors, and at her career’s end, McDonald owned the Seminoles’ all-time record with 939 career strikeouts from the pitching circle. Here’s something interesting… During and after her collegiate career, Tiffany played and coached at the international level. In 2006, as a sophomore, she…
Southern Utah has promoted former assistant coach Kortny Hall to become the Thunderbirds’ new head coach. Hall spent a single season as an assistant coach on Tom Gray’s staff with the Thunderbirds, serving as the program’s pitching coach. The Thunderbirds posted a 9-38 overall record in 2018, while the team’s pitching staff had a cumulative ERA over 7.00. Prior to joining the Thunderbirds, Hall spent three seasons as the head coach at Southern Virginia. During her time with the Knights, the squad posted an 18-84 overall record, improving from an 0-26 performance in Hall’s inaugural season to eleven victories in…
Former Utah star Hannah Flippen has been promoted to full-time assistant coach with the Utes. After her collegiate playing career ended in 2017, Flippen spent the 2018 season on the program’s coaching staff as a graduate assistant. During her four-year career with the Utes, Flippen earned three all-American awards and was named the PAC-12’s Player of the Year in back-to-back years in 2016 and 2017. She set the program’s all-time record in hits, runs, and batting average, and earned all-conference and all-region honors in each season of her career. Flippen was the first player in Utah history to earn the…
Mike White’s inaugural coaching staff at Texas will include a familiar face, as Chelsea Spencer has joined the Longhorns’ staff. Spencer served as an assistant coach under White at Oregon. Spending six years with the Oregon Ducks, all during White’s tenure as head coach in Eugene, Spencer was primarily in charge of the team’s defense and helped tutor a squad that averaged more than fifty wins a season and reached the Women’s College World Series four times, most recently in the 2018 campaign. Spencer tutored several all-American infielders during her time in Eugene, including two-time honorees Nikki Udria and Jenna…