Gary R. Gilmore is an American college baseball coach who is currently the head coach of the Coastal Carolina Chanticleers. He has held the position since the start of the 1996 season. Coastal Carolina has qualified for 17 NCAA tournaments, most recently in 2022. In 2016, the team made its first appearance in the College World Series and won the 2016 NCAA National Championship. He was elected to the ABCA Hall of Fame in 2022.
Playing and scouting careers
A native of Franklin County, Virginia, Gilmore played two seasons (1979–1980) of baseball at Coastal Carolina. A center fielder, Gilmore had a .353 career batting average. He also played minor league baseball in the Philadelphia Phillies organization for a short time.
In the early 1980s, Gilmore served as a scout for both the Seattle Mariners and Cleveland Indians. In 1982, Gilmore became a physical education teacher at Deep Creek Elementary School in Georgetown County, South Carolina. He later joined Pleasant Hill High School as an assistant baseball coach in the spring of 1983. Following the retirement of the head coach, Pleasant Hill promoted Gilmore to head coach for the 1984 season.
Coaching career
USC Aiken
In 1986, Gilmore left scouting to become an assistant coach at Division II USC Aiken. Prior to the start of the 1990 season, he was named the program's head coach. In his first two seasons, USC Aiken had a combined winning percentage of over .800 as an NAIA program. The school's athletic programs moved to NCAA Division II for the start of the 1991–1992 academic year. In 1992, the program's first NCAA season, the Pacers went 45–18–2 and qualified for the NCAA tournament. In 1993, Gilmore was named the Division II ABCA National Coach of the Year after USC Aiken went 46–18 and reached the Division II College World Series. In 1994 and 1995, Gilmore's final two seasons at USC Aiken, his teams had a combined record of 69–46, but both failed to qualify for the NCAA tournament.
Two future Major League Baseball players– Adam Riggs and Bryan Ward– played under Gilmore at USC Aiken.
Coastal Carolina
Gilmore became the head coach of Division I Coastal Carolina for the start of the 1996 season. After losing seasons in 1996 and 1997, the Chanticleers qualified for the postseason under Gilmore for the first time in 1998. With an 11–7 conference record, the team finished second in the Big South and qualified for the Big South Tournament. There, Coastal Carolina finished as the runner-up to Liberty. In 1999, the team won the Big South regular season championship with a 10–2 conference record. It hosted the Big South Tournament, but lost to Winthrop in the championship game. Gilmore was named the 1999 Big South Coach of the Year. In 2000, the team finished tied for fourth in the Big South and was eliminated early in the conference tournament.
In 2001, the team finished second and won the Big South Tournament to qualify for its first NCAA tournament during Gilmore's tenure. The team won its first two games in the double-elimination Athens Regional, but host Georgia came out of the loser's bracket to defeat the Chanticleers twice and advance to the Super Regionals.
From 2001 to 2005, Coastal Carolina made five consecutive appearances in the NCAA tournament; in that time span, it won four consecutive Big South Tournaments from 2001 to 2004, and Gilmore was named conference Coach of the Year in both 2002 and 2005. In the three NCAA tournaments from 2002 to 2004, the team finished no higher than third in a regional. In 2005 season, the team lost to Winthrop in the Big South Tournament championship game but received an at-large bid to the NCAA tournament, its first such bid in Gilmore's tenure. In the Tempe Regional, the Chanticleers lost in the regional final to Arizona State.
In 2006, Coastal Carolina went 30–27 and finished third in the Big South. At the conference tournament, which it hosted, the team went 1–2, and it did not receive a bid to the NCAA tournament.
From 2007 to 2012, Coastal Carolina won six consecutive Big South regular season and tournament titles; the program qualified for the NCAA tournament in each season. Gilmore won the Big South Coach of the Year award in five of the six seasons (2007–2010, 2012). The program won at least 40 games in each season and at least 50 in 2007, 2008, and 2010.