Now entering her fifth season as skipper of the Eastern Illinois softball program, Kim Schuette has turned the Panthers into serious contenders in the Ohio Valley Conference race each year.
After spending three seasons on the West Coast as an assistant coach at San Jose State, she secured her first head coaching stint at Quincy University. Following that season, she returned to Charleston back in the summer of 2005 after being named the 10th coach in EIU program history.
Prior to transferring to Indiana State in 2000-01, where she completed her collegiate playing career, Schuette was previously a former two-year letterwinner for the Panthers in 1998-99.
Under Schuette’s leadership, eight Panthers have been selected to the All-Ohio Valley Conference squads, including placing three players on both the All-Newcomer and All-Tournament squads and six Second-Team honorees.
Speed and power have been the key to Schuette’s success with the EIU program, as the Panthers have led the league in stolen bases the last two seasons, setting a new school mark in 2008 with 85 total thefts.
The Panthers also shine in a variety of other statistical categories, having been listed in the top five OVC rankings for hits, total bases, runs scored, RBIs, homeruns, ERA, strikeouts, opponent batting average, fielding percentage, and double-plays turned, just to name a few.
While individually, the Panthers have placed at least one player in the top five OVC rankings the last four seasons.
All-OVC Players Under Schuette
2009 ...
Kiley Holtz (So/IF) ... 2nd Team
Hailee Hanna (So/C) ... Newcomer
Amber May (Fr/P) ... Newcomer
2008 ...
Sarah Coppert (Jr/IF) ... 2nd Team
Denee' Menzione (So/IF) ... 2nd Team
2006 ...
Kathleen Jacoby (So/P) ... 2nd Team
Kathleen Jacoby (So/P) ... Newcomer
Rachel Karos (Sr/IF) ... 2nd Team
Sandyn Short (Jr/C) ... 2nd Team
OVC All-Tourney Team Honorees
2009 ...
Megan Nelson
2008 ...
Megan Nelson
2006 ...
Sarah Coppert & Karyn Mackie |
2009
Despite an up and down season, the Panthers finished the year with another appearance at the end-of-season OVC tournament, earning the sixth seed.
As a team, the 2009 Panthers would top the single-season homer number not just once, but twice, as the squad tied the previous high of 25 in the middle of April and then added two more bombs a few days later to set a new high of 27 home runs. Under coach Schuette, the Panthers have placed, set or improved upon the home run tally four consecutive seasons.
The Panthers opened the year with an undefeated 7-0 start, which marked the best season start in recent history. EIU captured the team title at the New Mexico State Troy Cox Classic, which included key wins over the previously undefeated, and host, Aggies.
Sophomore transfer Amber May, an eventual All-OVC Newcomer Team selection, had an impressive EIU debut, earning tournament MVP honors at the Aggie Classic, as she led the Panthers in the pitchers’ circle. Senior Sarah Coppert and junior Denee’ Menzione also earned all-tourney props following their outstanding opening weekend play.
Both May and Coppert would go on to earn the first Ohio Valley Conference ‘Pitcher’ and ‘Player of the Week’ honors and a couple weeks later, May and Kylie Holtz would sweep both weekly league awards yet again.
Holtz would earn her first collegiate league honor, as she was voted to the All-OVC Second Team, while freshman catcher Hailee Hanna joined May on the All-Newcomer unit. Holtz and Hanna finished atop the squad in hitting, behind a .306 and .294 mark, respectively. Both Holtz and junior Menzione each registered a team-high hit total of 52. More importantly, Holtz, Hanna and Menzione ended up with a combined home run tally of 17, with Menzione tying the single-season dinger mark with eight homers.
2008
The 2008 season saw EIU use a strong showing in close games to bounce back with a first-division finish in the OVC and a return appearance to the league tournament.
The Panthers posted 12 of their 20 victories in games decided by two runs or less. Despite being outscored 72-66 in OVC play, EIU posted a 12-9 conference mark to finish in fourth place in the standings.
Eastern was 6-2 in extra-inning games, winning all four of their extended affairs against league foes.
The Panthers had 15 games canceled by poor weather, including seven contests scheduled to be played at Williams Field. Eastern still managed to post a solid 7-3 record at home.
The Panthers led the OVC in stolen bases (85) and ranked 16th nationally, recording the third-highest total in program history. Megan Nelson (30) and Sarah Coppert (25) ranked 1-2 in the conference and both among the Top 25 nationally en route to posting the second-highest combined total among EIU teammates. Nelson became just the third player in program history to reach the 30-steal plateau in a season. Coppert, meanwhile, represents just the third player in EIU’s OVC era (1997-present) to register 20 RBIs, runs scored and stolen bases in a year.
Denee’ Menzione and Coppert both earned Second Team All-OVC honors. Menzione led the team with seven home runs, moving into third place on the program’s all-time long ball list with 11.
2007
In 2007, the Panthers broke the program record for doubles (ranking 31st nationally) and posted a third consecutive 20-home run campaign. Seniors Chelsea Adams, Sandyn Short and Katy Steele finished their careers as the most decorated offensive senior class in recent program history.
The pitching staff, meanwhile, recorded 253 strikeouts – the second-highest total in the history of the team. Each of the four pitchers had at least one save en route to a program-best seven as a staff. Karyn Mackie’s 1.94 ERA was the lowest by an EIU pitcher since 1999.
Late in the season, EIU defeated the University of Illinois and nationally-ranked Illinois State at home on consecutive Tuesdays. The 9-4 victory over the Illini was the program’s first. Eastern also posted a first-ever win against Tulsa.
2006
Schuette’s first year saw the Panthers win 36 games, end a two-year OVC Tournament drought and then make some noise in the playoff. After a four-run, last at-bat rally propelled EIU past Eastern Kentucky in the opening round, the Panthers upset second-seeded Jacksonville State. Schuette’s decisions from the dugout turned out to be the difference in the victory.
In the bottom of the seventh with the potential winning run on second base and two outs, Schuette intentionally walked the bases loaded, issuing free passes to JSU’s No. 4 and 5 hitters – both First Team All-OVC selections. The strategy payed off when Mackie got the next batter to fly out to right to end the inning. The Panthers went ahead in the top of the eighth and closed out the upset.
That victory was Eastern’s ninth straight against a league foe. Earlier in the month, the Panthers had sandwiched series sweeps against Austin Peay and Eastern Kentucky around a tournament berth-clinching win against Southeast Missouri. Schuette had her team peaking as the season reached its crescendo.
A number of freshmen that Schuette imported into the program after arriving on campus made key contributions. Headlining the group was Kathleen Jacoby, who won 21 games – the most by a Panther since 1988 – and pitched in more games than any player in EIU history. Other individual accomplishments included Rachel Karos’s program-record 18-game hitting streak.
Eastern as a team also set a new program record for fielding percentage (.969) and tied the double plays mark (19).
En route to a 21-win improvement from 2005, Schuette’s first EIU team also posted the second-highest win total of the Division I era. The third place OVC finish was the best since 2000.
Coaching Philsophy
In revamping the EIU roster over the last few seasons, Schuette plans to continue to recruit the state of Illinois first and foremost, especially locally. She has roots in the Chicagoland area – she prepped at Lake Park High School in suburban Roselle – and has a long-standing good relationship with nearby Lake Land College Athletic Director and softball coach Denny Throneberg. Schuette hopes to develop a pipeline between Lake Land and Eastern because it takes good coaches like Throneberg, who she describes as a brutally honest, world-wide known figure in the softball world, to prepare athletes for this level.
Schuette has also found a way to use Eastern’s status as the northern-most school in the Ohio Valley Conference as a positive when it comes to recruiting.
“It’s a huge selling point for softball players to know this is the coldest place in the conference – they will always be going south of here,” Schuette explains. “Other schools in the Midwest aren’t able to say that. Illinois has great softball talent and I am excited to bring as many Illinois kids as possible to this program and university.”
“You can’t live and die on one aspect of the game because if that one thing isn’t there one day, you can be in a lot of trouble,” Schuette says. “That’s the best part about softball. You can have a 90-pound player, who runs and runs and never hits the ball out of the infield, but can hit .500. Then you can have someone whose speed is not her strength but her role is to drive in that 90-pounder. All of a sudden you have a team.”
Meanwhile, Schuette also recognizes that a coaching staff needs to be flexible with strategy since a team’s strengths rarely are the same every season.
“I believe you have to be able to tweak your basic philosophy each year as each team’s strengths differ slightly,” the Itasca, Ill. native says. “Our initial goals are to put pressure on the opposition’s defense every time we’re up to bat, whether it’s running, bunting or putting the ball in play. Especially early in the year, small ball and putting the ball in play is key to take the pressure off of a one-swing offense.”
After graduating from Indiana State in 2001 with a bachelor’s degree in education, Schuette headed west to Northern California. While earning her master’s in kinesiology at SJSU, she served as a graduate assistant coach for a year before transitioning into the roll of top assistant on Dee Dee Enabenter’s staff. She credits her three-year experience on the West Coast, which has long been considered a softball hot bed, as a head coach preparatory period.
“Watching and observing the West Coast teams and their coaches helped teach me how they handle certain situations, how they handle their teams and what aspects they bring to the field,” Schuette says. “I think my West Coast experience made me a stronger person and a better coach.”
Enabenter employed what Schuette calls a Joe Torre style of coaching. She believed in observing practice, being there to help fix the little things and pull individual players aside. Thus, Schuette got the chance to run practice, conduct the drills and teach – an opportunity that a lot of assistants might not get regularly. She anticipates the western connections and contacts she made will come in handy as she continues to reshape the EIU program.
At Quincy
During her lone season at Quincy, Schuette guided her team into the Great Lakes Valley Conference postseason tournament. Among the best Division II leagues in the country, the conference was headlined by a Northern Kentucky team that went 51-0 in the regular season. Although the Lady Hawks were not the most naturally talented team in the GLVC, Schuette was able to lead her team to a berth in the six-team tournament following a first-division finish in the 13-team league.
While she was happy at Quincy and hadn’t planned on leaving after just one season, Schuette says the opportunity to return to her alma mater is one she could not pass up. She has family in the Charleston area; her brother Jeff and his family live in town and her parents moved to Mattoon in the summer of 2006. In fact, her sister-in-law Sonya works in Lantz too, as a professor in EIU’s Kinesiology and Sports Studies Department.
Collegiate Playing History
A versatile player who saw action in the outfield, at first base and in the pitcher’s circle during her collegiate career, Schuette played two seasons as a Panther from 1998-99 and then transferred to Indiana State for the final two seasons.
While at EIU, she earned consecutive academic honors, first in 1998 when she secured a spot on the OVC All-Academic Team, and then in 1999 after being honored as an NFCA Academic All-American.
During her ISU career, she not only led her team in batting average, hits and runs scored during her senior season, but also was tabbed to the 2001 All-Missouri Valley Conference. She continued to shine academically, as she earned a second NFCA Academic All-American honor and the recipient of the President’s Scholar-Athlete Award.
Personal
Schuette and EIU assistant coach Jason Dorey, who were married in the summer of 2007, reside in Charleston with their English Mastiff puppy, Moose and toddler, Lauren Lynn.