Longtime MCC softball head coach "Grady" Moorhead resigns

Friday, September 22, 2023 - 8:00 a.m. | Dylan DeVlieger

 Longtime Mesa Community College softball head coach Austin "Grady" Moorhead has resigned.

Moorhead has been the head coach of MCC softball since 2015 and since then has earned a record of 176-230. Moorhead led his team to the Region I postseason four times including last year where his team finished third.

Before Moorhead became the head coach he assisted at Mesa from 2009-11. In 2010 they went 42-22 and were the Region I, Division II runners-up. 

The impact Moorhead has left on his players is irreplaceable as he not only helped develop them as softball players but as young adults.

 "Coach Moorhead has been one of the best coaches I have ever had," said MCC All-American Tiffanee Frampton (2010-11). "He not only taught me lessons about softball but also about life. Coach Grady helped me most with the mental aspect of the game the two years I played for him."

Moorhead was also a camp director for all MCC skills camps and served as a volunteer coach for the East Valley Pride Softball Organization. In addition, he was an adjunct faculty member in the Exercise Science Department as well as a Student Service Representative in the cashier's office.

MCC has been honored and extremely lucky to have had coach Moorhead at the helm for such a long period of time. The connections he made with the players and the MCC community is something that will be cherished for a long time. MCC thanks coach Moorhead for all his hard work and dedication to making MCC softball as special as it is.

With Moorhead stepping away Raychele Hernandez will be stepping in as the interim head coach going into the 2024 season.

Hernandez graduated with her Bachelor of Arts degree in Psychology and a minor in Criminal Justice from Benedictine University Mesa in 2019. In 2022 Hernandez graduated from Benedectine University in Lisle, IL with her Masters Degree of Business Administration.

In her time on the diamond Hernandez has played at Phoenix College, Benedictine University, and at MCC in the 2017 season where she played under coach Moorhead. At PC Hernandez was voted top incoming freshman, during her time at MCC she was third team all-conference, and at BenU Mesa she captured (and still holds) the record of most stolen bases in a career with 26 all while having a .342 batting average.

Hernandez does have a plethora of coaching experience. As an undergraduate student she was the head coach of the 16U Redhawks travel ball team, in 2019-21 she was BenU's Women's Assistant coach, and in 2021 to May of 2023 was the interim head coach.

Click here, to view Hernandez's player profile while at MCC.