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Baseball
Stuart Lake is in his third season as an assistant coach at Ole Miss after being hired by head coach Mike Bianco on July 10, 2003.
Lake serves as the Rebels' hitting instructor and third base coach, and also coaches the outfielders.
His second season with the Rebels proved to be one of the best in the history of the program offensively. Two of the program's best hitters, Stephen Head and Brian Pettway, gained All-America status after leading the Rebels at the plate.
In the 2005 season, the Rebels produced more than 750 hits, scored more than 500 runs and drove in 462 runs on the way to a Western Division title, the program's first in 23 seasons. The offense was also a big part of the Rebels coming within one game of the College World Series, falling to eventual national champion Texas in the Oxford Super Regional.
Lake's tutelage at the plate also saw six of the Rebels hit over the .300 mark at the plate for the season.
In his first year at Ole Miss, Lake helped increase the Rebels' offensive production at the plate. Ole Miss belted 14 more home runs than in the previous year and the team's .443 slugging percentage was 33 points higher than the year before.
The Rebels also recorded 614 hits to top the 600-hit mark for the fifth straight season before breaking that mark again with more than 750 hits in 2005.
Lake also helped coach 1B/LHP Stephen Head to SEC Co-Player of the Year honors, and Head was also a finalist for the 2004 Golden Spikes Award, amateur baseball's most prestigious award, before being drafted in the 2nd round of the 2005 MLB draft.
Lake also had two of his outfielders get drafted in the 2004 year's Major League Baseball First-Year Player Draft. Seth Smith was a second-round selection by the Colorado Rockies and Charlie Babineaux was tabbed in the 28th round by the San Francisco Giants.In 2005, outfielder Brian Pettway earned All-America honors before being drafted in the 3rd round by Toronto.
Lake also had two other hitters drafted in the 2003 draft with SS Matt Tolbert going in the 16th round to Minnesota and C Barry Gunther being tabbed in the 17th round by Florida. In addition, C/DH Xan Barksdale signed a free agent deal with the Atlanta Braves. Gunther would return to Ole MIss for his senior season in 2005 before being drafted again by San Francisco.
Prior to coming to Ole Miss, Lake spent four years at South Carolina from 1999-2002 and one year at the College of Charleston in 2003.
With the College of Charleston, Lake served as third base coach, hitting instructor and outfield coach.
In his only season with the Cougars, Lake had two hitters drafted. Second baseman Lee Curtis posted a .399 average to earn his second straight Southern Conference Player of the Year award and was drafted in the eighth round by the Boston Red Sox in the 2003 Major League Baseball First-Year Player Draft. He also coached catcher Matt Lauderdale, who was selected in the ninth round by the San Diego Padres in 2003.
At South Carolina, Lake coached the outfielders, while also serving as first base coach and assisting with the hitters. During his time there, the Gamecocks won three SEC East titles and two overall SEC championships. South Carolina also played in three NCAA Super Regionals and reached the national championship game of the College World Series in 2002.
Lake also helped coach two SEC Player of the Year winners. One of those players, pitcher Kip Bouknight, whom Lake coached in high school, was also the 2002 Golden Spikes Award winner.
He also assisted with on-campus recruiting at South Carolina and the Gamecocks had four recruiting classes rank in the top 12 in the nation.
A 1994 graduate of Charleston Southern, Lake played two seasons for the Buccaneers in 1993 and 1994.
Lake also served as the head coach of the Edenton Steamers of the Coastal Plain League in 2000.
Prior to his college coaching career, Lake coached at his alma mater, Mid Carolina High School, and Brookland Cayce High School in Columbia, S.C. Brookland Cayce won the AAA state championship in Lake's second year in 1998.
Lake has coached more than 60 players who have gone on to play professional baseball in his nine-year coaching career. Six of those players were drafted in the first two rounds of the Major League Baseball First-Year Player Draft.
A 1994 graduate of Charleston Southern University, Lake played two seasons for the Buccaneers in 1993 and 1994. He graduated from Charleston Southern with a B.S. in Physical Education. In addition, he earned a Masters of Arts in Teaching at South Carolina in 1998.
Lake also graduated from Brinkman-Froeming Professional Baseball Umpire School in 1995.
Lake, 34, is married to the former Tracie Smith of Clover, S.C. Tracie is the head volleyball and softball coach at Lafayette High School in Oxford, Miss. The couple has a son, Hayden (1), who was born on November 17, 2004.
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