Pat Cottrell - Baseball Coach

Pat Cottrell

Title:
Assistant Coach
Email:
pcottre2@utm.edu
Phone:
731-881-3691

Pat Cottrell is in his third season as an assistant coach on the University of Tennessee at Martin baseball staff in 2024.

In 2023, the Skyhawks generated 14 Ohio Valley Conference victories - the most by any UT Martin team and the second-highest amount of any league member. The Skyhawks entered the OVC Championship tournament as the No. 3 seed - the best finish for the program in school history.

UT Martin broke 19 school records last spring, including most All-OVC performers as five Skyhawks (Zach Wager, Andrew Fernandez, Blaze Bell, Mac Danford, Caleb Hobson) each made the prestigious list. Hobson became the highest Major League Baseball Draft pick in school history (13th round to the Colorado Rockies) while Wager was the first UT Martin pitcher to be named a Freshman All-American and nab OVC Freshman of the Year status.

Last spring, the Skyhawks secured their second victory over a Southeastern Conference foe in as many years, downing Alabama by a 7-6 margin on March 1. UT Martin also had a record-setting offensive explosion in an April 23 win over Tennessee Tech, pushing across its most runs against a NCAA Division I opponent while tallying 47 total bases (the most for the program in 18 years) in a 24-17 victory. Blaze Bell capped off his rookie season with a nod on the OVC All-Freshman squad, becoming only the 15th different Skyhawk to earn that title.

Cottrell joined UT Martin out of Pensacola State College in Pensacola, Fla., where he was an assistant under Bryan Lewallyn from 2017-20. He coached eight All-Panhandle Conference honorees, four players who went on to play professionally and 26 student-athletes who moved on to the NCAA Division I ranks.

Prior to that, Cottrell was part of a record-setting run at the University of South Carolina Beaufort in Bluffton, SC. He was an assistant for two years under Lewallyn, helping the 2016 Sand Sharks to a national No. 8 ranking and a school-record 42 victories on their way to the first Sun Conference regular season championship in program history and national tournament appearance. USCB went 20-4 in league play in 2016, shattering the program record in eight single-season offensive categories while ranking in the top-25 in the NAIA in hits per game (10.7, 14^th) and runs per game (7.8, 22^nd). In Cottrell’s first season with the Sand Sharks, he coached an offense that ranked in the top-20 nationally in hits per game (10.7, 10^th) and runs per game (7.4, 17^th).

Cottrell spent three years as an assistant at Alabama Southern Community College in Monroeville, Ala. During the 2014 campaign, the Eagles collected a 36-16-1 record with a 23-7 mark in conference play, hitting .325 as a team and ranking ninth in the country in stolen bases (141).

Cottrell started his coaching career assisting with the infielders at Pensacola State College and the University of West Florida, his alma mater. He was on the Argonauts staff in 2011 when UWF won the 2011 NCAA Division II national championship, breaking school records for wins (52), conference victories (17) and longest winning streak (22 games). That team earned the program’s first No. 1 national ranking and ranked in the top-10 nationally in runs scored (449), ERA (2.71) and fielding percentage (.971).

After Cottrell was selected by the Tampa Bay Devil Rays in the 33^rd round (975^th overall) of the 2004 MLB Draft, he spent five seasons in the minor leagues. The right-handed slugger was an ABCA/Rawlings All-South Central Region and All-Gulf South Conference first team honoree as a senior at West Florida in 2004 – finishing his two-year career in the school’s top-10 in doubles (35, third), slugging percentage (.512, fourth), triples (seven, fifth), batting average (.345, sixth), RBI’s (71, eighth), total bases (196, eighth), hits (132, ninth) and runs scored (81, 10^th). That followed an all-conference career at Jefferson Davis Community College in Brewton, Ala.

A Chatom, Ala. native, Cottrell graduated from West Florida in 2011 with a degree in physical education. He is married to the former Jennifer Chambers and the couple has three children - Case, Brooks and Collins.