Report: USC expected to hire longtime Grand Canyon coach Andy Stankiewicz as new baseball coach

The USC Trojans have found their new baseball coach, according to Kendall Rodgers on Twitter. Andy Stankiewicz will lead the Trojans into 2023 after 11 seasons as head coach at Grand Canyon University.

Stankiewicz is a former major leaguer in the 1990’s who went on to coach a minor league team in New York before landing himself at GCU for over a decade. Taking over the program in 2012, Stankiewicz’s Antelopes struggled in his first season before leading them to 40 wins the following year.

The now-former GCU headman led the Antelopes to five WAC regular-season titles (2015, 2017, 2018, 2021, 2022). He won his first WAC tournament championship in 2021, while also leading them to the program’s first NCAA tournament appearance at the D-I level in the same year.

He followed that up by leading GCU to its first at-large selection into the NCAA tournament this past season. For his services, Stankiewicz has been awarded the WAC Coach of the Year award four times (2017, 2018, 2021, 2022) and will look to continue his success in Southern California.

Andy Katz details why USC, UCLA are ‘home run’ additions in basketball for Big Ten

Much has been made about what USC and UCLA bring to the Big Ten from a football standpoint. But college basketball insider Andy Katz discussed what they bring from a basketball perspective — and it’s a big boost.

Katz noted an interesting stat. Dating back to 2012, at least one of them has been in the NCAA Tournament every year except 2019. That makes the additions even more impressive for a conference that had nine bids to the big dance this past season.

That means the competition for Big Ten bids is going to get tougher, which isn’t a bad thing for the league.

“This is an absolute home run for both schools and the Big Ten, especially in men’s college basketball,” Katz said. “You’re now adding two programs that in the last nine NCAA Tournaments have only combined to miss it one time. So yes, in the last nine NCAA Tournaments, either both UCLA and USC were in it or just one. Only one time did that not happen in the last nine NCAA Tournaments.”