USA Softball announces Women’s National Team Coaching staffs for 2018 season

OKLAHOMA CITY – World No.1 USA announced the complete coaching staffs for the 2018 USA Softball Women’s National Team (WNT) Program. The coaches selected will lead their respective teams as they compete in tour stops and international competitions.

At the Japan All Star Series, the first event for the USA Softball WNT this summer, four-time Olympian Laura Berg will lead the Red, White and Blue and will be joined by assistant coaches Patty Gasso, Melyssa Lombardi and two-time Olympian Natasha Watley.  Berg and Watley were a part of the 2017 USA Softball Junior Women’s National Team coaching staff that led the U.S to a dominating Gold Medal performance at the WBSC Junior Women’s Softball World Championship 2017. Both Gasso and Lombardi will head into their first assignment as coaches for the National Team Program.

For the new USA Softball International Cup, Ken Eriksen will lead the WBSC World Championship roster and will be joined by Howard Dobson and Heather Tarr. All three return to the WNT program after guiding the U.S. to the Gold at last year’s Pan American Championship in the Dominican Republic. Gasso will lead the second U.S. roster, while Berg, Lombardi and Watley will serve as assistants.

At the WBSC Women’s World Championship, Eriksen will be joined by Dobson, Tarr and Berg in Chiba, Japan. The U.S. will look to defend their Gold Medal finish at the 2016 World Championship and qualify for the Olympic Games Tokyo 2020.

The coaching staff for the Japan Cup, which will be held in November in Takasaki, Japan, will be announced at a later date by USA Softball.