Gillespie National Coach of the Year

UC Irvine Coach Mike Gillespie was named Coach of the Year by the National Collegiate Baseball Writers Assn. on Saturday.

Gillespie, who became the 16th active head coach to reach 1,000 career victories earlier this season, has led UCI to its second College World Series appearance. Gillespie’s Anteaters were the No. 3 seed in the Corvallis Regional and defeated UNLV in the opening game and then stunned the No. 1 national seed, Oregon State, to advance to the Stillwater Super Regional.

In Stillwater, the ‘Eaters swept the best-of-three series against Oklahoma State to punch their ticket to Omaha, where they opened the College World Series on Saturday with a 3-1 win over Texas to improve to 41-23..

It is the second time in Gillespie’s career he has been named the National Coach of the Year, the first was after winning the NCAA title at USC in 1998. He makes his 20th NCAA postseason trip and fifth College World Series appearance and has guided UCI to the NCAA Tournament five of his seven seasons at the helm.

This is the 14th time in 27 seasons as a Division I coach that a Gillespie team has at least 40 wins.

— From staff reports