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Michelle Puls, a former Maine standout softball player, was named interim head coach on July 27, 2004. She will be serving in that role as Deb Smith takes a one-year leave of absence from her position due to personal reasons. Puls has spent the last five seasons at Maine as an assistant coach. She enters the year in her new role with a wealth of knowledge, including professional playing experience with the Akron Racers of the Women's Professional Softball League in the summer of 1999. While a student-athlete at Maine, Puls was the first individual to earn conference Player of the Year honors in two consecutive seasons. She was named Co-America East Player of the Year in 1997 after leading the conference with a .406 batting average and then hit .381 in 1998, earning the honor a second time. She was selected All-Northeast Regional and New England College Coaches Association All-Star first teams in 1997 and second team in 1998. Upon her graduation, she held Maine career records for games (178), at bats (527), runs (105), hits (184), and most doubles in a season (16) and season marks for doubles (16) and runs (39). She still holds two of those standards. As an assistant, her coaching responsibilities included infield, catchers and hitting. She also assistsed with recruiting and game preparation. Last season, with Puls assisting Smith, Maine posted a 28-23 mark and claimed the America East Championship, advancing to the NCAA Tournament for the second time in program history and the first time since 1994. Puls also is responsible for working with the team in the field and in four of her five years on the staff, the Black Bears have led the league in team defense. Under Puls' direction, four Black Bear infielders have earned All-America East honors over the past three seasons, including shortstop Brittany Cheney who was a first-team all-league selection last season after being named to both the second team All-America East squad and the league's All-Rookie Team in 2002. Puls was also instrumental in the development of former Black Bear catcher Sara Jewett, the America East and ECAC Player of the Year in 2000. Jewett set new America East single-season marks for home runs (15) and RBI (47) in 2000, as well as nine new Maine records. A native of Bangor, Puls attended Bangor High School and graduated from the University of Maine in 1998 with a degree in natural resources with a concentration in land use management. |
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