MANHATTAN, Kan. – K-State head baseball coach Pete Hughes announced the addition of Steve Englert, who has over 20 years of coaching experience, as the Wildcats’ volunteer assistant coach for the 2020 season.
Englert has served as the head coach of the Harwich Mariners of the Cape Cod Baseball League, regarded as the top collegiate summer league in the nation, since 2003. Englert has mentored over 40 current major leaguers, including former AL MVP Josh Donaldson and batting champion DJ LeMahieu.
“I couldn’t be happier with the latest addition to our coaching staff,” said Hughes, who enters his second season at the helm of the Wildcats. “Steve Englert is widely considered one of the top amateur baseball guys in the country. Not only is he an automatic future Cape Cod League Hall of Famer, but he is also one of the top baseball minds that I have had the privilege to share a dugout with. His abilities to motivate and develop the top players in the country will no doubt be an asset to our program.”
Englert has tutored more than 200 players currently in the professional ranks, averaging over 26 players selected in the MLB Draft each season. Other former Harwich Mariners include two-time Cy Young Award winner Tim Lincecum and former Giants All-Star and two-time world champion Brandon Belt.
Three current Wildcats – Connor McCullough, Carson Seymour and Cameron Thompson – played for Englert with the Harwich Mariners this past summer, leading the team to the title game of the Cape Cod League playoffs. McCullough was tabbed a 2019 CCBL All-Star in addition to being named CCBL Pitcher of the Week.
Englert is a two-time Cape Cod League Coach of the Year (2012, 2014) and has led Harwich to the CCBL championship in 2008 and 2011. Englert has been with the Mariners organization since the 1998 season, serving as an assistant until the 2002 season before being promoted to head coach in 2003.
A native of Boston, Massachusetts, Englert began his collegiate coaching career in 1998 at Richmond as an assistant coach. Englert was also an assistant coach at VCU, Holy Cross and Northeastern. He served as an assistant at Boston College for 12 seasons, including on Hughes’ Golden Eagles staff for five seasons (2002-06).
A 1987 graduate of Boston College, Englert is married to Lisa Kachnic, Dean and Chief of Oncology at New York Presbyterian-Columbia University. The couple has one daughter, Samantha, who graduated from Pitzer College in 2016.
The Wildcats, who return 19 letterwinners, officially begin their 2020 campaign on Friday, February 14 at UT Rio Grande Valley, beginning a four-game series. The Cats will unveil the renovated Tointon Family Stadium on Friday, February 28 with a doubleheader against Fairleigh Dickinson.
