The Texas Longhorns made a pair of headline-making moves last week, adding Steve Singleton as an assistant coach, while also improving their on-field product with the addition of transfer catcher Colleen Sullivan.
An incoming sophomore, Sullivan was part of the UCLA squad that won the 2019 Women’s College World Series. Starting thirty-two games on the season, Sullivan batted .239 with five home runs and twelve RBIs. She started four games for the Bruins in the WCWS, collecting fifteen at-bats.
Singleton joins the Texas staff as the hitting coach, replacing Kerry Shaw, who spent a single season as a Longhorns assistant. Singleton most recently was a hitting coach in the Minnesota Twins’ minor league system. Singleton coached on the staff for the MLB All-Star Futures Game in 2018 and was an assistant baseball coach at Florida SouthWestern State College in 2015.
During his own playing career, Singleton was drafted in the 11th round of the 2006 Major League Baseball Draft, playing more than 650 games in the Twins’ farm system an advancing as high as AAA. He finished his playing career with a .282 batting average and a trio of minor league all-star nominations.
The Texas offense finished the 2019 season with a .302 cumulative batting average, with forty-one home runs and a .452 slugging percentage. The Longhorns won 46 games on the season, in Mike White’s first year as head coach, and received the #9 seed in the NCAA tournament, advancing to the Tuscaloosa Super Regional before ultimately falling to Alabama one win away from the WCWS.
