Former LSU baseball coach Paul Mainieri coming back to coach an SEC rival

Former LSU baseball coach Paul Mainieri will be named the new head coach at South Carolina, according to a report by Kendall Rogers of D1Baseball.

Mainieri has been out of coaching since leaving LSU at the end of the 2021 season. He led LSU to the 2009 national championship and took the Tigers to Omaha on five separate occasions. He was LSU’s coach from 2007 to 2021 and had a 641-283-3 record with the Tigers. He won four regular season SEC titles and six SEC Tournaments.

He’ll replace Mark Kingston at South Carolina. Kingston was let go earlier this month after putting together a 37-25 record this season. He spent seven years at the school.

Terry Rooney, LSU baseball’s associate director of program development and recruiting, is set to join Mainieri at South Carolina. He’ll be joining as a pitching coach, according to D1Baseball.

Rooney was Mainieri’s pitching coach at LSU in 2007 and 2008 before leaving to be head coach at Central Florida. He was hired by Jay Johnson as the Tigers’ Associate Director of Program Development and Recruiting in 2023.