Dan McDonnell Named National Coach of the Year
June 30, 2007 | Baseball
June 30, 2007
BRENTWOOD, Tenn. - University of Louisville head baseball coach Dan McDonnell, who in his first season guided the Cardinals to its first College World Series, has been named Rivals.com National Coach of the Year.
McDonnell, who became the first head coach since 1980 to lead his team to Omaha in his first season, guided the Cards to a school record 47 wins and rolled past a host of milestones.
The 2007 Cardinal Nine featured a record nine All-Conference honorees and a record six picks in the MLB Draft. Louisville, playing in just its second NCAA Regional, notched its first postseason win, won its first regional and advanced to a Super Regional for the first time, setting three consecutive attendance records at Jim Patterson Stadium in taking two of three from Oklahoma State.
The Cardinals completed the 2007 season ranked sixth in one poll and seventh in two others after going 1-2 in the CWS.
After a third place finish in the BIG EAST, Louisville was eliminated in the BIG EAST Championship semifinals. After receiving an at-large bid into the NCAA Columbia Regional, the Cardinals won three consecutive elimination games, including the final two at host and 11th-ranked Missouri to advance to the Super Regional.
On June 27, McDonnell was named the 18th head coach of the Louisville baseball team. He played collegiately at The Citadel, where he competed in the College World Series in 1990, and went on to join the Bulldog coaching staff for eight seasons.
Prior to his arrival at U of L, he worked as the recruiting coordinator at Ole Miss for six seasons.
In McDonnell's 19 seasons in NCAA baseball as a player and coach, teams he has been a part of have averaged 38.1 wins per season and have advanced to a NCAA regional in 11 of those seasons, including eight of the last ten.
