Alfred University Softball Coaching Staff Earns Top Regional Honors

6/15/2015 10:57:00 AM

ALFRED, NY — The Alfred University softball coaching staff has earned top regional honors from the National Fastpitch Coaches Association.

The NFCA announced its Coaching Staffs of the Year for 2015 and AU earned Division III Northeast Region Coaching Staff of the Year honors. Staffs from eight regions were recognized, with winners chosen based on votes from coaches throughout each region. Tufts University, the national champion, was voted National Coaching Staff of the Year.
 

Alfred's staff is made up of 10^th-year head coach Gino Olivieri, ninth-year assistant Ralph Messura and graduate assistants Becky Zill (second year) and Nicole Pagano (first year). The Saxons wrapped up an historic year in 2015, going 40-7, with the 40 wins setting a new school single-season record.

AU won its first-ever outright regular-season Empire 8 Conference title, then won it's first-ever conference championship tournament crown to earn the league's automatic bid to the NCAA Division III playoffs. AU hosted a regional and swept three games to move on to the Tiffin (OH) Super Regional round, where the Saxons won two of three from host Heidelberg University to qualify for the eight-team championship tournament in Salem, VA.

Olivieri won his 250^th game in 2015 and, after a decade at the Saxons' helm, has a school-record 257 coaching wins and a 257-131 overall mark. He was named Empire 8 Conference Coach of the Year and ECAC Upstate Coach of the Year this season. He also earned E8 Coach of the Year honors in 2008 and 2010 and was ECAC Upstate Coach of the Year in 2010.

Messura has been an assistant for Olivieri since 2007, working primarily with infielders. He served as a volunteer assistant from 2007-10 and has been a part-time assistant since 2011. His daughter, Nicole, was an all-conference catcher for the Saxons, playing four seasons from 2006-09.
 

Zill wrapped up a two-year stint as a graduate assistant in 2015, serving on coaching staffs that madeconsecutive appearances in the NCAA playoffs. A 2013 graduate of Niagara University, where she played four seasons on the Division I softball team, Zill earned a master's degree in school counseling from AU in May.

Pagano completed her first year as a GA with the Saxons in 2015, coaching the pitching staff. She came to AU from Division I Mount St. Mary's University, where she was a four-year pitcher who set school career records for wins, strikeouts and innings pitches. Pagano is pursuing a master's degree in psychology from Alfred.