Former Knights, Rob Childress and Matt Deggs, are leading the Texas A&M baseball program back to national prominence.
Childress was a Knight from 1986-1990. In that time, he was twice named an all-conference pitcher. Northwood won an NAIA conference championship during his career and was runner-up at the regional tournament once. After graduating in 1990, Childress began his coaching career at Texarkana College, under current Arkansas head coach Dave Van Horn. Following two seasons as an assistant at Texarkana, Childress returned to Northwood where he spent two years as an assistant under current NU athletic director Pat Malcheski.
After leaving Northwood for a second time, Childress made stops at Texarkana College(head coach), Northwestern State College(pitching coach), University of Nebraska(pitching coach), and finally Texas A&M(head coach).
Childress graduated with a bachelor's degree in business administration from Northwood in 1990 and earned a master's degree of science from East Texas State (now TAMU-Commerce) in 1994. He and his wife Amanda (A&M Class of 1992) have a daughter, Hannah, 12, and a son Maxwell, 6.
Deggs and Childress have similar backgrounds. Both natives of Texas, the connection bega
n in 1993 when Deggs, a native of Texas City (same hometown as current NU assistant, Bobby Garza), played for Childress, while he was on the Knights coaching staff. Additionally, they spent two years together on Dave Van Horn's staff at Northwestern (La.) State in 1996 and 1997, and both served a stint as the head coach at Texarkana Junior College. One of only a handful of coaches to win both a Big 12 and an SEC title, Deggs spent three seasons at Arkansas as the hitting coach and recruiting coordinator for Van Horn from 2003 to 2005.Deggs began his college playing career at Alvin Junior College(1991-92) before transferring to Northwood(1993-94). He played professionally for three years for the Mobile (Ala.) Baysharks and the Tennessee Tomahawks, two of which were spent as a player/coach under former Boston Red Sox manager Butch Hobson and former Red Sox catcher Mike O' Berry. Deggs is married to the former Kathy Saldua (A&M Class of `94). The couple have a son, Kyler (9), a daughter, Klaire (5) and a daughter, Khloe (3).
Childress and Deggs just completed their fourth year at A&M. Named the Big 12's Coach of the Year by his peers in 2008, Childress guided the Aggies to 46 wins, their first regular-season championship in nine years and the first back-to-back NCAA regional championships in school history. Along the way A&M set a new school and Big 12 record by winning 16 straight conference games. After just one season at the helm, Childress orchestrated the biggest turnaround in NCAA Division I baseball. His 2007 team finished 48-19, winning 23 more games than in 2006, in addition to claiming the NCAA College Station Regional championship, a berth in the Super Regionals and the school's first Big 12 title since 1999.
The future is bright for the Aggie program as long as these two Knights continue to lead the way.
