by Julia Cuttone
Jamie Apicella, former Long Island University softball head coach, was named the Head of Softball Operations, for Team Beast Softball on August 31. Team Beast is based out of Commack, New York and his goal is to create a softball program parallel to Team Beast Baseball who is said to be placing their players at phenomenal colleges across the country.
Apicella will be providing training and curriculum for all the age groups as a roving instructor. He plans in the future to be on the sidelines for one of the teams, preparing them for the college softball level. “I believe what will set us apart from other organizations is running the program like a true organization. All of our staff and players will be on the same page from a standpoint of development. They will be taught the game at a very high level and will advance through the age groups learning the same concepts and building their softball IQ as they advance through the organization,” Apicella said.
“The reason I was drawn to coaching was knowing the impact you can make on a young person’s life.” He started coaching in 1996 after his professional baseball career with the San Francisco Giants organization that was cut short due to an injury. In 1996, Apicella became an assistant coach for the C.W. Post baseball team. He added that from that first moment of coaching, “I fell in love with the profession immediately.” He coached with the baseball team until the fall of 1998 and then in the winter of 1999, he was presented with an opportunity to be the Head Coach of the Softball team at C.W. Post.
With just his first year as Head Coach, they went to the NCAA Northeast Regional Final, “since that moment I was hooked,” he said. Since then Apicella was Head Coach there for 21 years. “I am most proud of seeing the success of my former student-athletes.” They have gone on to be doctors, lawyers, nurses, teachers, and more. He added, “My hope is the life lessons they learned under me helped them achieve their success.”
Apicella’s biggest accomplishments as a coach was winning the NCAA East Regional Tournament five times and advancing to the College World Series. “I had the opportunity to experience it five times and see my athletes on that stage made me extremely proud. On another note I loved being a part of a great region of softball. Over 21 years I saw tremendous growth of the sport in our region.” He added that there are many great people who had a part in building softball to the level it is at today. “I believe I did my part in helping grow the game and affording young women the phenomenal experience of participating in college softball.”
His expectation of this softball program is to get his softball players of the organization to become a prospective student-athlete for colleges. He continues to hold relationships with college coaches division one, two and three all over the country for now over 21 years. His staff will be professional people that have played and/or coached in college softball. Apicella added, “We are very excited to launch Team Beast Softball and my ultimate goal is to change the landscape of softball on Long Island the same way I helped change the landscape of softball in the Northeast for NCAA Division II softball.”
He said that the most important task of his and his staff’s is to do things the right way. “I feel there are a lot of organizations that form teams, put uniforms on and go play games but they miss on the development aspect.” He plans to have a 16U team this fall and some younger teams after the new year, as they are focusing on infrastructure right now and programming for all ages. He hopes by next August to have teams at each age group. Apicella added, I always would tell my teams that it’s a marathon not a sprint. I also to this day tell them it’s not how you start it’s how you finish that’s most important. We will use the same approach with how we build Team Beast Softball.”
