Collegiate softball legend Bill Galloway enters his 22nd season at East Texas Baptist University as the associate head coach after a stellar career at the NCAA Division I ranks. The NFCA Hall of Famer recorded over 900 wins coaching at Texas A&M and Louisiana Tech. In 2015, Louisiana Tech inducted him into their athletic hall of fame for his coaching career.
Shortly after retiring following a 20-year run as head coach at Louisiana Tech, Galloway joined the ETBU staff in 2003 as a part-time assistant coach. He continued to work with the program pitchers and in general off and on through the 2007 season. When that season ended, Shirley was named head coach. Her first move was to promote Galloway to a full-time top assistant coach on staff.
“Coach Galloway offers so much to me as a coach and to our program as a whole,” Shirley says. “The experience and knowledge that he brings to our staff is priceless. He has a deep knowledge of pitching and also has a wealth of contacts all over the country that are a tremendous asset in our recruiting efforts. I am fortunate to have the opportunity to work with and learn from a coach with such experience, and one that I respect so much.”
Coach Galloway was inducted into the NFCA Hall of Fame in 2001 and spent 20 years as head softball coach at Louisiana Tech. He joined the ETBU staff as a part-time pitching coach in 2003 and 2004 and then rejoined the program on a part-time basis in 2006.
Galloway has a wealth of fast-pitch coaching experience at the Division I level following stints as head coach at Louisiana Tech and Texas A&M. He has a 934-421 record (.689 winning percentage) at D-I, and his Louisiana Tech teams posted at least 30 wins in a season 16 times. That includes a 52-18 mark in his first season in Ruston in 1982. For his efforts at Louisiana Tech, he was inducted into their athletic hall of fame in the fall 2013.
The Lady Techsters made seven straight trips to the NCAA postseason under Galloway from 1983-89, including a fifth-place finish in the 1983 World Series. Overall, Tech finished with eight playoff appearances under Galloway.
In his career, Galloway had 11 players selected as All-American and has 10 former players currently working as head coaches at the collegiate level. He has coached 44 Regional All-Americans, and his players graduation rate ranks in the top 20 percent of NCAA schools.
In just his second season on staff at ETBU as part-time pitching coach in 2004, ETBU went 41-5 and finished the regular season ranked No. 1 in the nation in NCAA Division III. The ETBU staff that season, with Galloway serving as pitching coach, posted a 1.34 ERA and had four players -- Mandie McConnell, Kristen Abernathy, Ashley Stout and Carrie Mills -- finish with at least seven wins. The staff also held opponents to a .213 batting average in 46 games.
A 1978 graduate of Indiana University, Galloway holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Russian-Soviet Studies. He has also served in the United States Army. Coach Galloway and his wife, Liguya, moved to Marshall from Ruston, La., in 2007.
