Derek Hassell enters his first season as a volunteer assistant coach with UTRGV.
Hassell will help coach the outfielders, coach first base and organize all UTRGV baseball camps. He comes to the program after spending the last year as an associate scout for Prep Baseball Report.
Hassell has previous coaching experience as well spending the 2016 season as the volunteer assistant coach at the University of Texas at Tyler, where he worked with infielders and hitters.
Hassell also has head coaching experience, as he was the head coach at Carroll College, his alma mater from 2011-12. He played for Carroll College from 1998-01 setting a new school record for most hits in a season as a senior while also posting a .415 batting average.
In 2010, Hassell was the outfield and hitting coach at Furman University. Prior to his time at Furman, he was the director of baseball operations at TCU from 2008-09, where he was a part of a program that won two Mountain West Championships, made two NCAA Regionals and one NCAA Super Regional.
In 2006 and 2007, Hassell was an assistant coach at Charleston Southern University where he was the recruiting coordinator, hitting and infield coach and also coached third base. His first recruiting class produced three Louisville Slugger Freshman All-Americans in Derek Smith, Taylor Black, and Steve Antolik.
Prior to his time at Charleston Southern, Hassell was the head coach for the Solingen Alligators, a team in Germany’s highest baseball league. He led the team to its first ever German National Championship while helping the Alligators to their first Bundesliga North Division title.
Throughout his coaching career, Hassell has mentored over 50 players that have been drafted by Major League Baseball. He has also coached eight current or former major leaguers in Thad Weber, Blake Lalli, Tyler Thornburg, Andrew Cashner, Matt Carpenter, Bryan Holaday, Taylor Featherston and Jason Coats.
Hassell has a master's degree in Liberal Arts from TCU.
