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Bay Area native Mark O'Brien begins his eighth season as head coach at Santa Clara University. O'Brien recently signed a multi-year contract after leading the Broncos to their best season in more than 10 years in 2008. Including two regular season wins over NCAA Champion Fresno State, SCU posted a 33-22 (.600) overall record and finished third in the West Coast Conference. Highlights included: 10 All-WCC selections, an All-American and six players signing professional contracts. He heads into the 2009 season with a 199-190 overall record and, with just one more win, will become the third coach in program history to reach 200 wins. During his seven years on the Mission Campus, O'Brien has accomplished things that not many of his predecessors had. He became only the fourth coach in program history to win his 50th game in only his second season as head coach, joining Sal Taormina, Jerry McClain and John Oldham. The win was a savory one as he watched his team defeat the second-ranked Stanford Cardinal by a 2-0 score in Sunken Diamond, giving him his second career win over his former team. O'Brien became the school's 35th head coach in the 111 years of the program when he was hired on June 11, 2001. In only his second season, he guided the Broncos to their first winning season since 1997, posting a 31-26 overall record and a 21-9 mark in league play in 2003. Throughout his extensive coaching career, O'Brien has tutored 28 All-Americans. In his first three-years as the Broncos' skipper, O'Brien produced four All-Americans, becoming the first coach in school history to produce four All-Americans in such a short amount of time. Joey Gomes was a first-team selection in 2002 followed by Scott Dierks and Patrick Overholt in 2003, who earned honorable mention and Freshman All-American honors respectively. In 2004, Anthony Rea was a second-team honoree. In 2006, Matt Long and Matt Wickswat earned freshman team honors, while catcher Tommy Medica was named a Freshman All-American in 2007. Pitcher Thain Simon was the most recent to join that list in 2008. The three years prior to joining the Broncos, O'Brien served as an assistant coach at Stanford. O'Brien assisted with all aspects of the program, served as the Cardinal's hitting and fielding instructor and handled the duties of first base coach. During those three seasons Stanford qualified for the College World Series, taking home a third place finish in 1999 and back-to-back national runners-up in 2000 and 2001. O'Brien's infield led the nation in 2001 with a .977 fielding percentage and was among the top-five in the nation in 1999 and 2000. O'Brien was a critical component to the recruiting efforts at Stanford. The recruited class in 2001 was ranked No. 1 in the nation, while the classes in 1999 and 2000 were ranked in the top-10. His talents of recruiting can be traced back even to his earlier days at De Anza and Cal Poly. At De Anza, O'Brien was able to recruit 12 local high school seniors within a two-week period, while helping all nine sophomores already on the team continue on to four-year institutions. While at Cal Poly, O'Brien assisted in recruiting three-straight classes that were ranked in the top-40 by Collegiate Baseball. In his one season at De Anza, O'Brien led the Dons to a third-place finish in the Coast Conference. At Cal Poly, he served as recruiting coordinator, academic advisor and third base coach, as well as hitting and infield instructor. During the summers of 1996 and 1997, O'Brien served as head coach of the Anchorage Bucs in the Alaska Summer League. He led the Bucs to a 68-40 record and a league championship in 1996, while coaching four eventual first-round draft picks (Matt Ginter, Danny Peoples, Mark Redman and Alvie Shepard). Throughout his 11-year coaching career O'Brien has helped over 75 players advance on to professional baseball, including 10 first-round draft picks. O'Brien's list of first-rounders includes: Joe Borchard, Justin Wayne, Jason Young and the four players from the Anchorage Bucs. He also coached the 1999 minor league Player of the Year and Oakland A's outfielder Adam Piatt. Currently, there are 26 players in the major leagues that have played under O'Brien at some level, including A.J. LaBarbera `03 (San Francisco Giants), Daniel Nava `06 (Boston Red Sox) and Jason Matteucci `06 (Independent League). Other notable players that O'Brien has coached at some critical point of their career include: current member of the Chicago White Sox organization Carlos Quentin, three-time All-American and Stanford's all-time leading hitter John Gall, three-time All-American and Pac-10 RBI record holder Andrew Beinbrink, Santa Clara All-American Bill Mott and the NCAA all-time career saves leader Jack Krawczyk. O'Brien played collegiately at San Jose State from 1991-92 and was the Spartans' team captain in his final year. He was also named an Alaska Summer League All-Star in 1991 after coming to SJSU from St. Francis High School and De Anza College. O'Brien resides in Los Gatos with his wife Staci Duncan, a former women's soccer All-American at UCLA and the Bruins' all-time leader in points scored. The couple welcomed daughter, Brooklyn in August 2007. |
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