Dick Cooke, the winningest coach in the 116-year history of Davidson baseball, will take on new duties as a senior leader in the athletic department, including helping guide and support the college’s coaches.
The 2018 season, Cooke’s 28th, will be his last in the Wildcat dugout. Associate Head Coach Rucker Taylor will take over as Davidson’s new skipper at season’s end.
Cooke will hold the title of associate athletic director and he will oversee several of the men’s and women’s sports programs, serve as a mentor to new coaches, help strengthen coaches’ relationships with campus leaders, support recruiting and admission efforts and oversee on-campus sports scheduling. He joins Scott Applegate, Gavin Viano, Katy McNay, Jamie Hendricks and Beth Hayford in the senior leadership ranks in athletics.
“I personally thank Dick for his dedication to Davidson for 27 seasons,” said Director of Athletics Jim Murphy. “I congratulate him on a fantastic baseball career and reflect on the lives of players and fans he has connected with success. Any mention of Davidson baseball success starts with Coach Cooke and quickly gravitates to our sweep to the NCAA Super Regional. Dick helped create memories that will be with the program forever, as he leaves his signature on college baseball.”
Through 27 seasons, Cooke has ensured that his program aimed, not just to win, but support the long-term hopes and dreams of the scholar-athletes on his teams. Like all of Davidson’s sports, baseball is part of, not in addition to, students’ education; a point driven home last summer when graduating team members postponed start dates on their jobs to swing a bat in post-season play.
“It has been a great honor for me to witness the development of so many players and young men, on and off of the field over these last 27 years,” Cooke said. “That is the greatest reward you can hope for in a career, and it has made coming to the ballpark and being on this campus a distinct pleasure. Davidson College has been my professional life, and I look forward to helping it continue to move forward through a new post. I step away from Davidson baseball comfortable that the team will be in great hands with Rucker Taylor.”
Cooke was named Regional Coach of the Year in 2017 after leading the Wildcats to 35 wins and their most successful campaign in school history. In addition to its first-ever conference tournament title, Davidson captured the imagination of the baseball world by knocking off then-No. 2 National Seed North Carolina, not once, but twice, en route to sweeping the NCAA Regional.
Their run came to an end in College Station, Texas, at the Super Regional, but not before earning spots in multiple National Polls.
Cooke has won nearly 600 games, coached 56 all-conference performers, four academic All-Americans and sent a dozen players to the Major League Draft.
Cooke twice earned conference coach of the year honors. His resume includes coaching stops at his alma mater, Richmond, as an assistant from 1984-88, Belmont Abbey, where he was head coach from 1989 to 1990, and as an auxiliary and pitching coach for seven teams with USA Baseball, which governs amateur baseball and organizes the U.S. National team that competes in the Olympics.
