Maryville’s new softball head coach Courtney Conley and new baseball head coach Patrick Evers are helping their teams make an impact on the mound and in the lineup.
Maryville’s new softball head coach Courtney Conley and new baseball head coach Patrick Evers are helping their teams make an impact on the mound and in the lineup.
Courtney Conley, a former NCAA Division I Women’s World Series champion, hopes to add another championship ring, but this time as the Maryville softball head coach. Conley hit an RBI double and scored a run in the deciding game of the 2012 College World Series her junior year at the University of Alabama. After graduating, she started her coaching career at Missouri State University before moving on to become an assistant coach at Lindenwood University in 2017.
In addition to her championship pedigree, the former Missouri Gatorade Player of the Year (2007) also collected some coaching tips from her former Alabama coach Patrick Murphy, one of only 22 coaches to have racked up more than 1,000 victories at the Division I level.
“I spent a lot of my time as a player observing him,” Conley said. “Like with any career, having great mentors to lead you along the way is a big secret to success.” She hopes to bring that success to Maryville as she takes over a team that finished 26-21-1 and just two years removed from a team that went 39-16 and made a trip to the NCAA tournament.
“We expect to make it to post season this year,” Conley said. “We were only one game away from making the conference tournament last year. When we do get there this year, our goal changes to winning the conference tournament.”
Patrick Evers, Maryville’s new baseball coach also brings a winning pedigree to Saints Nation. Evers had 172 wins in just four seasons at Jefferson College, and also led the team to an appearance in the National Junior College Athletic Association (NJCAA) playoffs and a district championship in 2018.
Evers began his coaching career as an assistant coach at St. Louis Community College before moving on to the University of Central Missouri as a pitching coach. His first head coaching role came with the St. Charles Mules in 2009, a team in the St. Louis Metro Collegiate League. He was out on a recruiting trip in Oklahoma when he received his own recruiting call from Maryville’s athletic director Lonnie Folks. Evers knew instantly it was the right decision to continue his coaching career at Maryville.
“I’m thrilled to be the Saints head coach and am excited to get to know my players as they mature as student-athletes,” Evers said. “Being able to see your players grow up on and off the field as they go through college is extremely rewarding.”