50  Tom Holliday
	Position: Associate Head Coach Experience: 6th season

One of the most highly regarded and respected coaches in the business, Tom Holliday joined the NC State baseball coaching staff on July 7, 2006, as associate head coach. A year later, he assumed the duties as the team's pitching coach as well. Holliday brings 35 years of coaching experience at the collegiate level to the Wolfpack staff.

In just four seasons as NC State's pitching coach, Holliday has coached three All-ACC pitchers and two All-Americans. He has had 14 hurlers selected in Major League Baseball's June draft, including a second-rounder, a fifth-rounder, a sixth-rounder, two eighth-rounders and an 11th-rounder.

A year ago, Holliday's pitching staff posted a 4.14 staff ERA, and with Cory Mazzoni anchoring the rotation and Chris Overman at the back end of the bullpen, the pitching was a team strength.
Mazzoni finished the season with six wins despite minimal run support, and led the rotation with a 3.30 ERA. He wound up notching 137 strikeouts, third most in a single season in program history. He saved his best for last, going 3-0 with a 1.19 ERA his final five starts, striking out 49 and walking just five in 37 2.3 innings.

Mazzoni shut out Boston College the last weekend of the regular season, then whitewashed seventh-ranked Florida State in the ACC Tournament. He finished his season by shutting down a loaded Georgia Southern squad in the NCAA Columbia Regional, holding the Eagles to two runs on four hits in eight innings while striking out 12.

Mazzoni's late-season surge lifted his stock in the Major League Baseball draft, and the New York Mets selected him in the second round.

Overman emerged as one of the ACC's top closers in March and wound up 6-3 with a 2.39 ERA and seven saves in 30 appearances. Three of those 30 outings saw Overman yield nine of the 13 earned runs he allowed all season. In his other 27 appearances, his ERA was 0.81 in 44 2/3 innings.

In addition to Mazzoni and Overman, Holliday had great success with senior righthander Rob Chamra, who led the staff with eight wins and had a 4.35 ERA. In back-to-back appearances vs. fifth-ranked North Carolina and top-ranked Virginia, Chamra allowed two runs, both unearned, on eight hits in 12 1/3 innings.

Holliday has gotten results like that from his pitchers throughout his coaching career. His first season as the Wolfpack's pitching coach, 2008, was a smashing success. NC State spent the bulk of the `08 season in the national top five in staff ERA and finished eighth at 3.72. Starter Clayton Shunick and reliever Jimmy Gillheeney earned All-America honors, only the fourth time in school history that NC State produced multiple pitching All-Americans in a single season.

Shunick finished 10th in the nation in strikeouts with 114 and ranked in the top 50 in ERA at 2.76. He was fourth in the Atlantic Coast Conference in innings pitched (101), third in ERA and opponents' batting average (.224), and second in strikeouts. Gillheeney converted 10 of 11 save opportunities and allowed just five runs (only four earned) in 32 innings the entire season. Opponents batted a mere .209 against Gillheeney.

Gillheeney anchored a bullpen that shut down opposing offenses. Wolfpack relievers won 19 games, posted a 2.98 ERA, converted 19 of 22 save opportunities, and held opponents to a .228 batting average. Holliday's bullpen was deep and versatile. Seven NC State relievers made at least 10 or more appearances, six worked at least 20 innings, seven converted save opportunities, and 10 recorded wins.

By season's end, NC State had recorded its lowest opponents' batting average in four years (.242), notched its most strikeouts in a season in five years (518), and posted its best staff ERA since 1993. Six NC State pitchers were selected in the 2008 Major League Baseball draft, twice as many as in any previous draft.

Gillheeney moved into the weekend starting rotation in 2009 and remained one of college baseball's most successful pitchers, winning six games with a 3.86 ERA and earning second-team All-ACC honors. The Seattle Mariners selected Gillheeney in the seventh round of the 2009 MLB draft, and Sam Brown, John Lambert and Kyle Rutter also were taken in the MLB draft, making it 10 Wolfpack pitchers drafted in Holliday's first two seasons as pitching coach.

In 2010, Holliday got stellar campaigns from righthanded starters Jake Buchanan and Cory Mazzoni, along with lefty reliever Grant Sasser. Buchanan and Mazzoni combined to start 32 games and log 196 2/3 innings. Buchanan led the staff with eight wins and 96 strikeouts, while Mazzoni won seven and fanned 89. The Houston Astros selected Buchanan in the eighth round of the 2010 June Draft.

Sasser emerged during the course of the `10 season as one of the ACC's most reliable relievers. In addition to winning three games and saving five, Sasser held opposing hitters to a .205 batting average. He allowed 19 runs in 48 innings, but nine of them came in just two outings. In his other 45 innings, he sported an ERA of 2.00. He also stranded 21 of 25 inherited runners, an 84 percent stranded rate that easily was the best ratio on the team.

Holliday, who began his coaching career at the University of Miami in January of 1976, and has known nothing but success as a college coach. He owns a 281-150 record as a head coach and has a combined record of 1630-642 in 35 years as an assistant and head coach in the college ranks. In all, Holliday has coached with 14 teams that participated in the College World Series in Omaha, including two that won the national championship.

Holliday began his coaching career as a graduate assistant at his alma mater, Miami, in 1976. After one season with the Hurricanes, Holliday went to Arizona State University for the Sun Devils' run to the 1977 national championship. He has been with winning programs ever since. After one season at Arizona State, Holliday spent the next 26 years at Oklahoma State University in Stillwater, Okla., the first 19 as the Cowboys' pitching coach and recruiting coordinator. He was the Cowboys' head coach from 1997-2003.

In Holliday's 26 years in Stillwater, Oklahoma State made 11 College World Series appearances, including seven in a row from 1981-87. The Cowboys played in the CWS championship game in 1981, 1987 and 1990. He took Oklahoma State to Omaha as head coach in 1999, finishing the year with a 46-21 record and ranked No. 8 in the country. The Cowboys won 50 games or more eight times while Holliday was on the staff, including 61 victories in 1988, and averaged more than 47 wins per season. Holliday coached 10 first-team All-Americans and 27 total All-Americans at Stillwater, 92 all-conference performers, seven Freshman All-Americans, two U.S. Olympians and six U.S. National Team members, 52 academic all-conference honorees, and 155 players who went on to careers in professional baseball, including nine who were first-round draft picks.

Holliday worked with numerous Oklahoma State players who went on to major league careers, including Pete Incaviglia (Baseball America's Player of the Century), Robin Ventura (Baseball America's Player of the Decade for the 1980s), Jeromy Burnitz, Mickey Tettleton, Doug Dascenzo, Scott Williamson, Mike Henneman, Luke Scott, Scott Baker, Matt Smith, Jeff Salazar and Josh Fields.

Holliday was the pitching coach at the University of Texas from 2004-06. The Longhorns were NCAA runners-up in 2004, his first year in Austin, then won the national championship in 2005. Collegiate Baseball magazine named him its 2005 National College Pitching Coach of the Year. Each of Holliday's three Longhorn pitching staffs ranked among the nation's leaders statistically, and three of his pitchers at UT earned All-America honors. Seventeen members of Holliday's three Texas pitching staffs went on to play professional baseball, and three -- Sam LeCure, J.P. Howell, and 2005 American League Rookie of the Year Huston Street -- reached the big leagues.

A native of Uniontown, Pa., Holliday and his wife Kathy, have two sons, Josh and Matt. Josh is a former Wolfpack volunteer assistant coach and is currently an assistant coach and recruiting coordinator at Vanderbilt. Matt is the starting left fielder for the St. Louis Cardinals, is a four-time National League All-Star and was MVP of the 2007 National League Championship Series. Josh and Matt both are married. Josh has two children; Matt has three.