Ten years after throwing her final pitch for the Arizona Wildcats, Taryne Mowatt is back at her alma mater — this time as a coach. She didn’t need much convincing.
Mowatt, who led the Wildcats to their seventh and eighth national titles in 2006 and 2007, received a phone call in October about the open pitching coach position at Arizona. Stacy Iveson had moved to an administrative role.
The 31-year-old Mowatt applied, waited a week and a half for the job post to close and then started to plan. Mowatt hopped on a plane on a Monday, interviewed the same day and started on Tuesday.
“And then I sent for a moving company to bring the rest of my stuff,” Mowatt said.
The Star talked to Mowatt on Tuesday as she prepared for her first season as a UA coach. Here’s what she had to say about playing for Mike Candrea, striking out on her own — and returning home. The Wildcats open their season Feb. 9 at the Kajikawa Classic in Tempe.
An Arizona ace
A Southern California native, Mowatt said she wanted to win a national championship and knew Arizona would give her a great opportunity to do so.
“I just loved the campus, I wanted to win and it was close enough to home that my family could come see, but far enough that they couldn’t come to my doorstep,” Mowatt said,
Mowatt played for Arizona from 2005-2008, winning a pair of Women’s College World Series titles. As a junior, Mowatt set WCWS records for innings pitched (60), strikeouts (76) and complete games (8), and was named tournament MVP.
Her performance led her to a pair of ESPYs for Best Female Athlete and Best Female College Athlete.
The 5-foot-6-inch pitcher’s 100-33 career record ranks seventh in program history. She ranks second in both strikeouts (1,267) and innings pitched (877º); Mowatt also holds program records for strikeouts in a game, strikeouts in a season, appearances in a season, games started in a season, complete games in a season, innings pitched in a season and victories in a season.
Mowatt was selected in the first round of the 2008 National Pro Fastpitch Draft and played for five teams in a six-year period. She even spent a season in the Netherlands.
Finding the way back
Mowatt never really considered becoming a coach, but she said she felt she learned a lot from her time in the pro league. Then one summer, while driving back home to visit relatives, her sister, a high-schooler bound for Cal Baptist, called her.
“Would you want to be my college coach?”
“I said, ‘absolutely not; that sounds terrible,’” Mowatt recalled.
“But I ended up applying and just seeing what it was about and I ended up getting the job. So that’s what really got me into coaching, and I got to coach my sister in college for a couple of years.”
It was during her three-year stint (2011-14) at Division II Cal Baptist that Mowatt retired from playing.
From there, Mowatt moved to North Carolina, where she worked in marketing and advertising while coaching high school and travel teams.
It wasn’t long before a big coaching opportunity presented itself. Mowatt was online and saw the pitching coach position at Ole Miss had opened up, so she decided to apply.
“I got a call that night,” Mowatt said. “I checked out the campus and it was a really good opportunity for me, so I ended up there.”
Mowatt inherited a pitching staff that posted a 4.30 ERA in 2015.
By the time Mowatt left, the figure was down to 2.10.
Candrea — and the rest of college softball — noticed. Mowatt was back in Tucson after two seasons in the Southeastern Conference.
“I love it. It really feels like coming home,” Mowatt said. “I enjoyed all the different stops I made along the way, but the ultimate goal for me was to eventually end up back in Tucson.”
Preparing for
the new season
Mowatt says her transition has been a relatively easy one, in part because of her knowledge of the program — and especially because of Candrea, who is entering his 33rd season with the Wildcats.
Mowatt said she was a little intimidated at first because Candrea has such high standards for everybody , from players to staff.
“I came in the middle of the fall season, and we just hit the ground running because I know what (Candrea’s) culture of the team is, I know what his philosophies are, I know what he teaches,” Mowatt said. “So, already having that knowledge being one of his players, and being able to reinforce what he’s already been teaching for the last couple decades, has been pretty rewarding.”
Mowatt arrived with only one week’s worth of practices remaining. The toughest part of the otherwise seamless transition was building a relationship with the team.
“It’s just been a matter of getting to know the players and know the girls and working with the pitchers and kind of introducing what kind of coach I am — what kind of style I have in the bullpen,” Mowatt said. “Just getting that relationship with the pitchers.”
Mowatt hopes to share what she’s learned along the way with her new team and help them achieve the same goals. Even if it means Mowatt gets bumped off the record books.
“To me, this is where a lot of my great memories were and where I did a lot of growing up,” Mowatt said.
“So, to be able to return and hopefully help give that same experience to the players that are on our team now, I would love for them to have as much fun as I did when I was here.”
