This month McMurry athletic director Bill Libby announced the promotion of John Byington to head coach of McMurry baseball, replacing Lee Driggers who resigned to fill the head coaching poisition at Wheaton (Ill.). Also this summer, Centenary announced that Scott Kushner will take the reigns as the new Head Baseball Coach and Jim Tetkoskie moved up from assistant to head coach at his alma mater, Penn State Harrisburg.

Byington, who has been a part of the McMurry coaching staff for ten years, becomes just the second head coach at McMurry since the school brought back baseball in 1996 after a 47-year absence.

Byington's promotion to McMurry's head coach marks his first head coaching job at a collegiate institution; however, Byington already has head coaching experience at the collegiate level as in the summer of 2007 he was head coach of the Athletes in Action Fire, which competed in the Alaska Baseball League. He guided the Fire to a 26-15 record and their only championship in the six-team league.

"[McMurry] is a nice program to inherit," Byington said. "It was run so effectively under Coach Driggers and has a lot of respect in the baseball world. It's nice to have a good foundation to work with. My goal for the program is to grow on that foundation and become a national contender on a yearly basis."

Kushner, has made the move to Centenary from the United States Merchant Marine Academy, where he was the Head Baseball Coach for the last two years. While at the Academy he handled all the baseball operations and over his two year tenure was able to improve the program's output in nearly every statistical category. Prior to his pair of seasons at Kings Point, Kushner was an Assistant/Interim Head Coach at Swarthmore College in Pennsylvania, from 2003-2006.

Before his coaching career, Coach Kushner was a four year starting centerfielder for Swarthmore College (99-02). During his playing days he was chosen as a two-year captain, the Hustle Award Winner ('99), a Two-time Dick Hall Award Winner ('01-'02), an All-Centennial Conference selection ('01-'02), and finished his career among the Top 10 in numerous statistical category's on Swarthmore's All-Time list. Kushner made baseball headlines this summer when he was married at Coca Cola Park in the Lehigh Valley.

After serving three years as Penn State Harrisburg’s assistant baseball coach, Jim Tetkoskie moved up in the ranks as the Nittany Lion’s new Head Coach for 2008-09 season. Tetkoskie looks to continue expanding the baseball program by developing the current roster of players, as well as, the incoming recruits.

Before coming to Penn State Harrisburg as the assistant coach in 2005, Tetkoskie was an activate baseball coach with Cumberland County American Legion, Cumberland County VFW teams, and is still active with the Central York County Adult League. Tetkoskie showed Penn State Harrisburg he was knowledgeable and enthusiast about molding the blue and white’s young players into great Penn State Harrisburg student-athletes.