Cerritos College Athletics - Baseball News: Ex-Falcon Tim Walton leads Florida softball team

Photo courtesy: Gatorzone.com

Photo of Tim Walton coaching a softball player.

Photo courtesy: Tim Casey (flickr.com)

Back in 1992-93, Tim Walton was a starting pitcher for the Cerritos College baseball team, and led the Falcons to the South Coast Conference championship his freshmen year. Upon his graduation, he transferred to the University of Oklahoma before spending two years pitching in the Philadelphia Phillies minor league system. These days, Walton is serving as the head coach of the University of Florida softball team, where he has led them to the #1 ranking in the nation and set an NCAA record with 70 wins this season.

As he led the Gators to their third appearance in the NCAA playoffs in as many year, Walton also guided his team to their first Women's College World Series in their 12-year existence. But before they could get to the championship series, Florida was eliminated by Texas A&M University, 1-0 in nine innings, ending the most successful season in Florida history. For his efforts with this year's Florida team, Walton was named the Southeastern Conference Coach of the Year, while the team finished the year with a 70-5 record.

Over the course of his career, Walton has already been a part of a baseball College World Series and a softball College World Series, both while he was at the University of Oklahoma. As a junior on the 1994 Sooner team, he earned the win in the national championship game, a 13-5 win over Georgia Tech, while he was an assistant coach on the Oklahoma softball team as their hitting and outfielders coach when they won the title in 2000. In the baseball national championship game, Walton pitched 2.1 innings of relief and went 7-3 that year.

Walton began his coaching career as an assistant coach in 1997 with the Oral Roberts University baseball team, before switching to softball in 1999 as an assistant coach at Oklahoma. He was named the head coach at Wichita State University in 2003 and remained until he was hired as the head coach at Florida in 2006. In his third year with the Gators, Walton has compiled a 163-52 record and appearances in the regional playoffs all three years.

While with the Falcons, Walton was a 2nd Team All-South Coast Conference selection as a sophomore, while he also earned the team's Most Inspirational Player Award both years. He was also voted the Team Captain as a sophomore.