Bill "Skip" Mathews (2017) - Eckerd College Athletics Hall of Fame

Eckerd College Athletics Hall of Fame

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Bill "Skip" Mathews

Class

1979
Induction

2017
Sport(s)

Baseball, Administration

Bill Mathews, affectionately known as "Skip" by many in the Eckerd community, served as the head coach of the Eckerd baseball program for 24 seasons beginning in 1991.The Eckerd alumnus joined the program as a freshman in 1975 and became an assistant coach in 1978.
After working as a high school coach and administrator following a four-year stint as an assistant coach at Eckerd, he returned to take the reins of the program in 1990 from longtime head coach John Mayotte.
From there, Mathews began the work that earned him a spot among Eckerd's elite.
Mathews became the program's winningest coach in 2011 with his 437th victory and eventually reached 504 wins before leaving the dugout in 2014.During his span at the helm, Mathews was honored as the Sunshine State Conference Coach of the Year in 1999 and also spent six years as a member of the NCAA Baseball Committee.
His teams regularly excelled in the classroom, leading the conference in players named to the Commissioner's Honor Roll for over 20 years.A total of 96.5 percent of his student-athletes who spent four years in the program earned their college degrees.
Mathews remains very active in the local and international baseball scene. He is the official scorer for the Tampa Bay Rays and is a member of the MLB Advisory Committee On Scoring, considered to be one of the foremost scoring experts in the world.
He has coached the Polish National Team to two gold and two silver medals and was a former bench coach for the Swedish National Team. Mathews is also a board member of International Sports Group, which is responsible for coordinating baseball clinics worldwide from September through February.
After choosing to hand over the reins of the program, Mathews transitioned into the role of Assistant Athletic Director in the summer of 2014 where he is responsible for general administrative duties. He also serves as a member of the Eckerd faculty, teaching courses in athletic administration.
His number 29 was officially retired on May 6, 2016, and is displayed on a banner on the right field fence at the Turley Athletic Complex.

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