Monday, June 21, 2004
SOFTBALL COACH JOHN BYRNE & STAFF NAMED NFCA EAST REGION
COACHING STAFF OF THE YEAR FOR SECOND CONSECUTIVE SEASON
STARKVILLE, MS --- Moravian College head softball coach John Byrne and
his staff of assistant coaches Scot Dapp, Scott Hoke, Ron
Cardinal, Becky Stroup and Erin Kelly have been
named the 2004 National Fastpitch Coaches Association Division III East Region Coaching
Staff of the Year announced Thursday by the NFCA. This is the second straight season that
the Greyhound coaching staff has been honored as the East Region Coaching Staff of the
Year.
Head coach John Tschida and his staff from national champion the University of St. Thomas
(Minnesota) was named the Speedline/NFCA Division III National Coaching Staff of the Year
as well as the Midwest Region Coaching Staff of the Year. All eight Regional Coach Staffs
of the Year, which can be found at www.nfca.org, will
be honored at the 2004 NFCA Convention in Las Vegas, Nevada this December.
Byrne and the rest of the staff led Moravian to a 40-6 record this season,
the squad’s fifth consecutive Commonwealth Conference Championship and the program’s
seventh straight NCAA Division III Tournament berth. The Greyhounds won their first-ever
NCAA Regional Championship and advanced to the NCAA Division III World Series were the
team finished the year as the national runner-up to St. Thomas.
Moravian entered the 2004 season with six seniors on the roster and the goal for Byrne,
his staff as the players to make the World Series for the first time in school history.
In his first 11 seasons as head coach of Moravian, Byrne has guided
the Greyhounds to a 333-117 record, the school’s first seven NCAA Division III National
Championship Tournament berths, the first trip to the NCAA Division III World Series with
a runner-up finish, five Middle Atlantic Conference playoff appearances, four Commonwealth
Conference playoff berths and six Commonwealth Conference Championships. Byrne,
who earned his 300th career victory this season with an 11-3 victory versus Methodist (NC)
College at the 2004 NFCA Leadoff Classic in LaGrange, Georgia, which the Greyhounds won,
was named Commonwealth Conference Coach of the Year in 2000, 2002 and 2004.
Byrne’s teams have won at least 23 games in each of his 11 seasons
including a 23-8 mark during his debut season in 1994, and six of those 11 teams have topped
the 30-win plateau including the 2004 squad, which was 40-6, a school record for victories
by any sport. Byrne has also guided the Greyhounds to the postseason in
each of the last ten years with MAC playoff berths in 1995, 1996, 1997 and 2000; Commonwealth
Conference tournament appearances in 2001, 2002, 2003 and 2004 and NCAA Division III National
Championship Tournament berths in 1998, 1999, 2000, 2001, 2002, 2003 and 2004.
Dapp, Moravian’s head football coach, has been on Byrne’s staff
in each of his 11 seasons while Cardinal, Moravian’s CHAMPS/Life
Skills Coordinator and an assistant football coach, and Hoke have each
coached for seven years. Stroup, a former NFCA All-Region pitcher for
Moravian, finished her fourth season with the staff while Kelly, a four-year
letterwinner at the University of Delaware, completed her second year on the Greyhound
staff.
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