Patrick Murphy, Alyson Habetz take over LSU softball program

BATON ROUGE - Patrick Murphy, who led Alabama to over 700 victories, seven Women's College World Series appearances and six SEC Championships, has been named the head softball coach at LSU, vice chancellor and director of athletics Joe Alleva announced on Thursday.

Murphy leaves Tuscaloosa for the program previously coached by his mentor, NFCA and Louisiana Hall of the Fame coach, Yvette Girouard. The Waterloo, Iowa, native comes to Baton Rouge with a career .772 winning percentage, fourth-highest in NCAA history.

Alyson Habetz, Alabama's Associate Head Coach, will also join Murphy at LSU. Habetz, a native of Crowley, was a NFCA Third Team All-American and a member of the 1993 WCWS team at Louisiana-Lafayette during her playing days. Habetz has been a member of Murphy's staff at Alabama for 13 years.

A press conference to formally introduce Murphy as LSU's fifth softball coach will be held at 3 p.m. on Friday at the Athletic Administration Building. The press conference can also been seen at www.LSUsports.net/live.

"We are very excited to bring Patrick to LSU to lead our softball program," Alleva said. "Patrick has done an outstanding job building Alabama into one of the nation's premier programs. When Yvette (Girouard) retired we lost a Hall of Fame coach. We feel like we are replacing Yvette with a future Hall of Famer."

Murphy guided the Crimson Tide to a 53-11 mark and a third place finish at the 2011 Women's College World Series. Alabama also won its second straight SEC regular season championship under the direction of Murphy in 2011. The Crimson Tide had four players notch NFCA All-American honors and five garner All-SEC selections, including two-time SEC Pitcher of the Year, Kelsi Dunne.

In 13 seasons at the helm of the Alabama program, Murphy racked up an impressive 712-210 overall record and 13 straight NCAA Regional appearances. The Crimson Tide garnered a 287-76 clip in SEC action en route to six league championships - three tournament and three regular season.

In addition to its regular season SEC title in 2011, Alabama also garnered regular season league titles under Murphy during 2006 and 2010. The Crimson Tide secured SEC Tournament titles in 2003, 2005 and 2010.

Alabama reached 50 wins nine times under Murphy highlighted by seven straight seasons of 50 or more wins dating back to 2005. The Crimson Tide posted a pair of 60-win campaigns in 2000 and 2005 on their way to the WCWS in addition to trips in 2003, 2006, 2008, 2009 and 2011.

Individually, 17 players earned NFCA All-American honors, 126 were named Academic All-SEC and seven garnered Academic All-American honors. Murphy's coaching staff was earned NFCA South Region Staff of the Year on six different occasions.

Murphy graduated from University of Northern Iowa with a B.S. in history education in 1988 and earned his master's degree four years later in mass communication while serving as Girouard's top assistant at Louisiana-Lafayette.