Eastern Illinois University Athletics

After spending three years as an assistant coach on the West Coast at San Jose State and a head-coaching stint at Quincy University, former Panther Kim Schuette has returned to campus and enters her fifth year as the leader of the Eastern Illinois softball program.

           

A two-year letter-winner at Eastern before transferring to Indiana State, Schuette was hired in July of 2005 as the 10th coach in program history.

 

The 2008 season saw EIU use a strong showing in close games to bounce back with a first-division finish in the Ohio Valley Conference and return appearance at 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.

           

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.

           

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.

           

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 paid 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.

           

A versatile player who saw action in the outfield, at first base and in the pitcher’s circle during her collegiate career, Schuette plans to prepare her players to be able to play multiple positions.

           

“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.

           

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.

           

In revamping the EIU roster over the next few seasons, Schuette plans 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.”

           

Schuette and assistant coach Jason Dorey, who were married 2007, reside in Charleston with their new baby daughter Lauren Lynn, and English Mastiff puppy, Moose.