FROM CBB NEWS SOURCE
STATESBORO, Ga. – Bringing professional and collegiate playing experience to Georgia Southern, Matt Rademacher joins the Eagle Baseball staff as a volunteer assistant coach for the 2011 season. Rademacher served as the volunteer coach last season at Air Force and played one year of professional baseball prior to becoming a coach.
“I am very excited about the addition of Matt Rademacher to our staff,” said Head Coach Rodney Hennon. “We were looking for a quality catching instructor to complete our staff and Matt carries the experience in both coaching and playing that we were looking for. He is a very energetic, young coach who will be an asset to our program.”
Rademacher most recently spent the summer coaching in the Northwoods Collegiate League for the Madison Mallards. As the pitching coach, Rademacher tutored the pitching staff to the second-best ERA in the league, while the team also owned the league’s lowest opponent batting average of .237. Left-handed pitcher Rusty Shellhorn was selected to the Postseason All-Star Team after going 3-3 on the season, tallying a 2.40 ERA and limiting his opponents to a .209 batting average.
At Air Force, Rademacher worked directly with the Falcon catchers, while also helping supervise the hitters. He coached catcher Garrett Custons to three freshman All-America honors. Custons was named to the Louisville Slugger Freshmen All-America Team by Collegiate Baseball, Ping!Baseball Freshman All-America Team and Pro-Line Athletic NCBWA Freshman All-America Team. Custons batted .328 with nine home runs and 64 RBI and led the Mountain West Conference with 16 stolen bases. With 24 starts behind the plate, Custons threw out 14 base runners, good for 48.3 percent throw-out rate.
Rademacher finished his professional playing career before joining the Air Force staff, playing most recently with the Traverse City Beach Bums of the Frontier Independent League. He helped anchor a pitching staff that was second in the league in ERA.
Collegiately, Rademacher earned first-team All-Big South honors as a catcher his senior season with Coastal Carolina. Also as a senior, he earned second-team all-region honors and helped lead the Chanticleers to their first regional host in school history, with the Myrtle Beach, S.C., regional. An all-around student-athlete, Rademacher also excelled in the classroom, earning All-Big South Academic honors in both 2006 and 2007.
Prior to Coastal Carolina, Rademacher spent three years, including a redshirt year, at the University of Michigan. From 2003-06, Rademacher spent the summers in Alexandria, Minn., playing for the Alexandria Beetles of the Northwood’s Summer Collegiate League.
A native of Bay City, Mich., Rademacher is a 2007 graduate of Coastal Carolina University with a Bachelor of Arts in English.
