Andy Lopez

Andy Lopez is currently the head baseball coach at the University of Arizona. He is a veteran coach of Mexican-American descent from California who has compiled an 855-541-7 record in his 24 seasons as a head baseball coach. In six seasons as the head baseball coach at Arizona, he has put the Wildcats back on the national map. He has had four straight Top 10 recruiting classes, as well as three straight Post-Season tournaments. In his five seasons, he has compiled a 168-123-1(.597) record.

He is one of only 10 active coaches to have won a national championship, as well as one of only 3 coaches to lead three different programs to the College World Series. His teams have appeared in the postseason 12 out of 24(half) of his coaching years. He has earned National Coach of the Year honors two times, and Conference Coach of the Year honors eight times.He previously coached at Florida, at Pepperdine, and at Cal State Dominguez Hills.

He began his coaching career at Cal State Dominguez Hills in 1983. The team won CCAA championships, and became a Division II national championship contender. From 1986 to 1987, his teams won back to back CCAA championships, and later won the D-II College World Series. In six seasons as the head coach, he compiled a 168-152-2(.525) record.

In 1989, he was hired as the head baseball coach at Pepperdine. In six seasons, he compiled a 241-107-3(.691) record. In only his first season, he went 41-19-1, and ultimately won four consecutive post-season tournaments. In 1992, his team won the only National Championship in school history. The 3-2 victory over Cal-State Fullerton earned him consensus National Coach of the Year honors.

During his seven seasons at the University of Florida, he compiled a 278-159-1(.636) record. He won two SEC championships, five NCAA Tournament appearances, and two College World series appearances. While at UF, he coached major leaguers David Eckstein, Mark Ellis, Brad Wilkerson, David Ross, Ryan Shealy and Josh Fogg. He also averaged an impressive 40 wins per season, including a school record 50 games in 1996. Lopez, however, was controversial with some University of Florida faithful for not recruiting local players and for not extending scholarships to players that he did not recruit to the program. Eventually, Lopez suffered declining success as evidenced by the 35-27 record in 2001, his last year at the University of Florida, and was let go by University of Florida athletic director Jeremy Foley.

External links

*http://www.arizonaathletics.com/ViewArticle.dbml?DB_OEM_ID=1600&ATCLID=38674
* [http://www.AndyLopezBrighterDay.org Andy Lopez Brighter Day Foundation]