John Savage (baseball)

John Savage (born February 27, 1965) is currently the head baseball coach at UCLA in Los Angeles, California.^[1]

Early career

Before becoming a coach, Savage played two years with the Cincinnati Reds organization, after three years playing at Santa Clara University. In 1987, he helped the Salt Lake City Trappers set a professional baseball record of 29 consecutive victories.

In 1991, Savage received a bachelor's degree in secondary education from the University of Nevada.

Savage's coaching career started at his alma mater Reno (NV) High School as a pitching coach in 1988. Between 1992 and 2000, Savage was an assistant coach at Nevada and USC. During this period, his teams won one national championship, and played in 5 regionals and 2 super regionals.

Head coaching career

Savage was the head baseball coach of the UC Irvine Anteaters baseball program from 2002 to 2004. Under Savage, UC Irvine had a record of 88-84-1 (32-34 conference) and participated in the South Bend Regional in 2004.

UCLA went 15-41 in 2005, its first season under Savage. In 2006, the program qualified for the NCAA Tournament, where it went 1-2 in the Malibu Regional. In 2007, the team advanced to the Super Regional round.

The 2008 team became UCLA's first to appear in three consecutive NCAA tournaments. In the regular season, UCLA played 18 games against teams ranked in Baseball America's weekly top-25 poll. Savage helped lead the Bruins to series victories in three of the team's four Pac-10 road series.

In 2010, Savage's team advanced to the College World Series by defeating the defending National Champion LSU Tigers in the Los Angeles Regional and the Cal State Fullerton Titans in the Los Angeles Super Regional. The Bruins finished the season in second place, losing two games to the South Carolina Gamecocks in the Championship Series. He was named the national Coach of the Year by CollegeBaseballInsider.com in 2010.^[2] He was also named 2010 NCAA Division I Western Regional Coach of the Year by the American Baseball Coaches Association (ABCA).

In 2012, he led UCLA to the College World Series by defeating TCU in the Los Angeles Super Regional. The Bruins finished the season in 5th place, losing to Arizona and Florida State in the second round.

In 2013, he guided UCLA to the College World Series by defeating Cal State Fullerton. This was the team's third appearance in the College World Series in four years. The team defeated No. 1-seed North Carolina (4–1) to advance to the Championship series where they beat Mississippi State to win the NCAA national title.^[3] He was named the National Coach of the Year by Collegiate Baseball Newspaper and Baseball America, and the ABCA West Region Coach of the Year.^[4] After winning the first national CWS championship, Savage agreed to extend his contract with UCLA to 2025 with an increase in salary.^[5][6]

Savage served as the manager for USA Baseball's Collegiate National Team in the summer of 2017. He led the U.S. team to a 15-5 record that summer, including an 11-4 mark during international play. The United States won all three international series in which it competed, going 4-0 against Chinese Taipei and 3-2 versus both Cuba and Japan. The win over Cuba marked the third consecutive series win for the United States.^[7]

Record

UCLA vs. Florida at the 2010 CWS

The Cal Poly Mustangs vs. the UCLA Bruins at the 2013 L.A. Regional at Jackie Robinson Stadium on June 1, 2013

Season	Team	Overall	Conference	Standing	Postseason
UC Irvine Anteaters (Big West Conference) (2002–2004)
2002	UC Irvine	33–26	14–10	T–4th
2003	UC Irvine	21–35	8–13	T–5th
2004	UC Irvine	34–23–1	10–11	T–4th	NCAA Regional
UC Irvine:		88–84–1	30–34
UCLA Bruins (Pac-12 Conference) (2005–present)
2005	UCLA	15–41	4–20	8th
2006	UCLA	33–25	13–10	3rd	NCAA Regional
2007	UCLA	33–28	14–10	3rd	NCAA Super Regional
2008	UCLA	33–27	13–11	3rd	NCAA Regional
2009	UCLA	27–29	15–12	T–3rd
2010	UCLA	51–17	18–9	2nd	College World Series Runner-up
2011	UCLA	35–24	18–9	1st	NCAA Regional
2012	UCLA	48–16	20–10	T–1st	College World Series
2013	UCLA	49–17	21–9	3rd	College World Series Champions
2014	UCLA	25–30–1	12–18	9th
2015	UCLA	45–16	22–8	1st	NCAA Regional
2016	UCLA	25–31	12–18	10th
2017	UCLA	30-27	19-11	3rd	NCAA Regional
UCLA:		449–328–1		[8]
Total:		535–409–2
National champion         Postseason invitational champion         Conference regular season champion         Conference regular season and conference tournament champion       Division regular season champion       Division regular season and conference tournament champion       Conference tournament champion

Personal

John Savage is from Reno, Nevada where he grew up with two brothers Len and Pete. He went to school at Reno High School where he was a record setting pitcher. Savage and his wife, Lisa, have four children: Julia, Jack, Ryan and Gabrielle.^[9]

He is also the son-in-law of former Nevada Wolf Pack football coach Chris Ault.^[10]

See also

• List of current NCAA Division I baseball coaches

References

External links

• Official UCLA Profile