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Dave Serrano, in his sixth season as Cal State Fullerton’s pitching coach and recruiting coordinator, has quickly established himself as one of the top assistant coaches in the country. Baseball America has called Serrano the top assistant coach on the West Coast and has repeatedly noted his strength as a pitching coach. His recruiting efforts have played a large part in Fullerton's ongoing success. Collegiate Baseball named the Titans’ incoming 2001 class as the top recruiting class in the country and Baseball America tabbed the class as the second best in the nation. Since Serrano’s arrival, each of the Titans’ recruiting classes has ranked among the top 15 nationally. During his watch at Fullerton, 13 pitchers have been drafted, and already, three of his Fullerton products (Matt Wise, Adam Johnson and Brandon Duckworth) have reached the Majors. Serrano also coached a pair of future Major Leaguers on the 1996 Tennessee team in Mike Lincoln and R.A. Dickey. Of the 13 Titans to earn All-American honors at Fullerton since Serrano’s arrival in 1997, nine have been pitchers. In 2001 alone, four Titan pitchers earned a total of 14 All-American citations, including Kirk Saarloos, who was a finalist for virtually every National Pitcher of the Year award. Serrano has also coached 14 all-conference hurlers, including three of the last four conference Pitchers of the Year (Benito Flores in 1998, Johnson in 2000 and Saarloos in 2001). Serrano’s staffs have led the conference in ERA in every season except 1999, when Pacific’s 4.29 ERA barely clipped Fullerton’s 4.44 mark. In 2000, Serrano’s pitchers posted a 3.95 ERA, the 17th best mark in the nation and the first sub-4.00 ERA by a Titan team since the 1995 College World Series championship season. The staff bettered that performance in 2001, ranking 14th nationally with a 3.60 ERA. Serrano, 36, in seven years of coaching at the Division I level, has been to Omaha three times with two different programs. He was the pitching coach and recruiting coordinator in 1995 and 1996 at the University of Tennessee for Head Coach Rod Delmonico. He helped the Volunteers reach the College World Series in 1995, the first time they had visited Omaha in 44 years. At Fullerton in 1999, Serrano molded an assortment of question mark arms into an exclamation point staff that propelled Fullerton to its 10th Omaha bid. Serrano has coached more than two dozen pitchers who are currently playing professional baseball. At Tennessee, he coached a pair of first-round draft picks in Dickey and Todd Helton, the latter of whom has blossomed into one of the best hitters in baseball after also having pitched at Tennessee. This is Serrano’s second go-around as an assistant to Horton. He worked with him at Cerritos College for three years (1988-90) before Horton moved to Fullerton in 1991 as an assistant to Augie Garrido. Serrano remained at Cerritos through the 1994 season. In his seven-year tenure, Cerritos won a state championship (1989) and six conference titles, including 1991, when Serrano was the Falcons’ head coach and earned South Coast Conference Coach of the Year honors. Serrano graduated from Cerritos High School in 1982 and played two seasons at Cerritos College. In 1985, he went 12-1 and earned junior college All-American honors while helping the Falcons go 39-5 and win the state championship. Serrano then pitched for Cal State Fullerton in 1986, posting a 3-4 record with one save in 15 appearances. He and his six-year old son, Kyle, reside in Placentia.
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