Greg Burnett
Head Baseball Coach
gburnett@tlu.edu
(830) 372-6982
Texas Lutheran University promoted Greg Burnett from associate head coach to head baseball coach in May of 2007.
Burnett, 35, joined the Texas Lutheran Athletics staff for the 1998-99 academic year and has been Miller’s top assistant for the past nine seasons. Burnett was promoted to associate head coach prior to the 2002 season.
“Greg Burnett, with his nine years of experience here, knows just about all there is to know about Texas Lutheran baseball,” said Miller, TLU’s director of athletics, who retired after 15 years as the Bulldogs’ head coach. “Greg is an outstanding role model. He is a passionate coach, and I think you have to have passion to coach the game. I think he is a players coach, and he and I believe in a lot of the same things. I think it will be an easy transition for the team.”
“Greg has a tremendous knowledge of baseball, and he studies it constantly. He treats the players with respect. They respond to his knowledge of the game and to his personality. I could not think of anybody that would be a better fit for our baseball program.”
Burnett has been the primary recruiter for the Bulldogs since joining the TLU baseball program in the summer of 1998. Burnett came to TLU after serving as the assistant to the athletic director at Texas A&M University at Commerce, Texas. He has a master’s degree in health and physical education from Texas A&M-Commerce. Burnett completed his bachelor’s degree in 1995 at Howard Payne University, where he majored in psychology and graduated with a 3.7 grade point average.
“I am extremely honored to be able to follow in Bill Miller’s footsteps, and I look forward to the challenge of keeping the program at the same high level of national competitiveness that it has achieved for the past 15 years,” said Burnett.
With Miller and Burnett leading the way, the Texas Lutheran baseball team has a 316-93-2 record (a .771 winning percentage) over the past nine seasons. In that same time span, the Bulldogs have won three American Southwest Conference Championships, one Heart of Texas Conference Championship and six American Southwest Conference West Division Championships.
TLU also has played in three NCAA Division III West Regional Championships (finishing as the West Region runner-up in 2005 and 2006) and in two NAIA Region VI Tournaments in that nine-year run.
This past Friday, TLU concluded a 37-10-1 season at the NCAA Division III regional tournament in Orange, Calif.
The Bulldogs finished 2005 and 2006 with rankings in the Top 15 of the American Baseball Coaches Association/Collegiate Baseball Poll for NCAA Division III. The Bulldogs are ranked 15th in the second-to-last poll for the 2007 season.
The Bulldogs joined the American Southwest Conference for the 2001 baseball season; and since that time, TLU has a .788 winning percentage in conference play with a record of 123-33. In seven years in the ASC West Division, TLU has six first-place finishes and one third-place finish.
Burnett, a native of DeSoto, Texas, played two years of college baseball at Cedar Valley College in Lancaster, Texas. Cedar Valley is a part of the Dallas County Community College District.
After his time at Cedar Valley, Burnett enrolled at Howard Payne University, where he played his final two years of collegiate baseball. At Howard Payne, Burnett was named the Texas Intercollegiate Athletic Association Co-Most Valuable Player in his senior season. Along with Texas Lutheran, Howard Payne is now a member of the American Southwest Conference.
Burnett and his wife Michelle live in Seguin with their two children – a daughter, Ashley, and a son, Andrew.