Bradley Littleton Babcock (March 10, 1939 – June 2, 2020) was an American

college baseball College baseball is baseball that is played on the intercollegiate level at institutions of higher education. In comparison to football and basketball, college competition in the United States plays a smaller role in developing professional pl ...

coach, the head coach of

James Madison James Madison Jr. (March 16, 1751June 28, 1836) was an American statesman, diplomat, and Founding Father. He served as the fourth president of the United States from 1809 to 1817. Madison is hailed as the "Father of the Constitution" for hi ...

(JMU) from 1971 to 1989. Under him, the Dukes appeared in five NCAA Tournaments (four in Division I) and the 1983 College World Series. His overall record in 19 seasons was 555–251–4, including a home record of 339–71–1.

Coaching career

After graduating from

Lynchburg College The University of Lynchburg, formerly Lynchburg College, is a private university associated with the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) and located in Lynchburg, Virginia. It has approximately 2,800 undergraduate and graduate students. ...

in 1963, Babcock worked as a high school baseball coach in

Colorado Colorado (, other variants) is a state in the Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. It encompasses most of the Southern Rocky Mountains, as well as the northeastern portion of the Colorado Plateau and the western edge of t ...

New Hampshire New Hampshire is a U.S. state, state in the New England region of the northeastern United States. It is bordered by Massachusetts to the south, Vermont to the west, Maine and the Gulf of Maine to the east, and the Canadian province of Quebec t ...

, and

Vermont Vermont () is a state in the northeast New England region of the United States. Vermont is bordered by the states of Massachusetts to the south, New Hampshire to the east, and New York to the west, and the Canadian province of Quebec to ...

. James Madison started its baseball program in 1970, shortly after it became co-educational. Babcock took over in 1971, its second season. It started out as an

NCAA Division II NCAA Division II (D-II) is an intermediate-level division of competition in the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA). It offers an alternative to both the larger and better-funded Division I and to the scholarship-free environmen ...

program but joined Division I for the 1977 season. In addition to being JMU's baseball coach, Babcock held several other positions in the early 1970s. At the university, he was an assistant football coach, junior varsity basketball coach, physical education instructor, and intramural director. He also served as the head coach of the

Valley League A valley is an elongated low area often running between Hill, hills or Mountain, mountains, which will typically contain a river or stream running from one end to the other. Most valleys are formed by erosion of the land surface by rivers ...

Harrisonburg Turks The Harrisonburg Turks are a collegiate summer baseball team in Harrisonburg, Virginia. They play in the South Division of the Valley Baseball League, a collegiate wooden bat summer league consisting of 11 teams in the state of Virginia. The Turks ...

for several summers. In 1983, the Dukes became the first Virginia school to make the

College World Series The College World Series (CWS), officially the NCAA Men's College World Series (MCWS), is an annual baseball tournament held in June in Omaha, Nebraska. The MCWS is the culmination of the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Divisi ...

(CWS). The Dukes opened the season with an exhibition game against the

St. Louis Cardinals The St. Louis Cardinals are an American professional baseball team based in St. Louis. The Cardinals compete in Major League Baseball (MLB) as a member club of the National League (NL) Central division. Since the 2006 season, the Cardinals hav ...

. After losing in the ECAC Tournament, many players returned home, thinking the season was over, but the team was given an at-large bid to the NCAA Tournament. JMU went 4–0 in the East Regional to reach the CWS, where it lost games to

Texas Texas (, ; Spanish language, Spanish: ''Texas'', ''Tejas'') is a state in the South Central United States, South Central region of the United States. At 268,596 square miles (695,662 km2), and with more than 29.1 million residents in 2 ...

and

Stanford Stanford University, officially Leland Stanford Junior University, is a private research university in Stanford, California. The campus occupies , among the largest in the United States, and enrolls over 17,000 students. Stanford is considere ...

in Omaha.

Head coaching record

Below is a table of Babcock's yearly records as a collegiate head baseball coach.

Administrative career

After stepping down from the baseball coach position following the 1989 season, Babcock worked in JMU's athletic department. He was added to the department's Hall of Fame in 1998. He retired as executive association athletic director in 2003.

Personal

Babcock's son

Whit Whit may refer to: * Whit or Whitsun, another name for the holy day of Pentecost * Whit (given name) * Whit (novel), by Iain Banks * WHIT, a radio station licensed to Madison, Wisconsin, United States, which holds the call sign WHIT beginning 2009 ...

is the athletic director at

Virginia Tech Virginia Tech (formally the Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University and informally VT, or VPI) is a Public university, public Land-grant college, land-grant research university with its main campus in Blacksburg, Virginia. It also ...

; he previously held the same position at

Cincinnati Cincinnati ( ) is a city in the U.S. state of Ohio and the county seat of Hamilton County. Settled in 1788, the city is located at the northern side of the confluence of the Licking and Ohio rivers, the latter of which marks the state line wit ...

. Whit was the batboy on the 1983 College World Series team and played for Babcock in 1989, his final season as JMU's head coach. Babcock died on June 2, 2020 at the age of 81.

Notes

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Babcock, Brad 1939 births 2020 deaths Baseball coaches from Virginia Baseball players from Virginia Baseball shortstops High school baseball coaches in the United States James Madison Dukes baseball coaches James Madison Dukes football coaches Lynchburg Hornets baseball players