MORRISTOWN, N.J. - The College of Saint Elizabeth's athletic department has announced the hiring of Arlan Freeman as the first head baseball coach in school history.

Freeman comes to CSE from SUNY New Paltz where he was the interim head baseball coach for the past two seasons.  Over his two seasons at New Paltz, Arlan led the team to its first conference playoff win in 17 years and was named SUNYAC Coach of the Year.  In the classroom, his team had a GPA over 3.1 and had 15 players named to the Commissioner's Academic Honor Roll with GPA's above 3.3.

Coming from two years as an interim, Freeman is excited to take on the challenge of starting his own program.  "This is a unique opportunity not many people have the chance to do; building a program into a contender by finding the student athletes that will represent the CSE name proudly.  I am eager to start putting the pieces of our championship culture together.  We will do this by focusing our effort in recruiting the person, not the player.  This notion is extremely important when starting a program."

Prior to New Paltz, Freeman spent three seasons at Stevens Institute of Technology in Hoboken, N.J.  At Stevens, Freeman served as the pitching coach and recruiting coordinator.  In 2015, the Stevens coaching staff was named Empire 8 Coaching Staff of the Year.  In 2014, Stevens won the conference championship and earned automatic bids to the NCAA Tournament.

Freeman has also had stops at Division II schools Felician College, Lynn University and Barry University.

Throughout Freeman's 10+ years of coaching, he has coached more than 30 players who played professionally and 20 who have made it to the Major Leagues, including Yan Gomes of the Cleveland Indians, Tyler Kinley of the Minnesota Twins and former first round picks, Matt Harvey, Tyler Lyons and Jesse Hann and Shawn Tolleson.

Freeman is a graduate from Plymouth State University with a bachelor's degree in Physical Education and has a master's degree from Barry University in Sport Management.  Freeman currently resides in Little Falls, N.J.

Freeman is honored to be a part of the CSE community. "My family and I are thrilled to be part of the College of Saint Elizabeth athletic department.  I would like to thank Juliene Simpson along with the members of the search committee for entrusting me to build a successful baseball program here at CSE."

Announced in April, CSE will be joining the Colonial States Athletic Association (CSAC) for the 2019-20 season.  The Eagles inaugural season will take place in the new conference.  Freeman believes it will be a great spot for his program. "With the athletic department entering a new phase in 2019 by joining the CSAC, we look forward as a program to helping the CSE department establish itself as a formidable contender among the schools to compete in the conference."

CSE's first ever baseball game will be played in the spring of 2020.