Nick Petree was promoted to Missouri State’s pitching coach in July 2022 after spending the previous four seasons as the Bears’ Director of Player Development.
In his first season managing the MoState pitching staff, the Bears had the program's highest strikeout rate (9.28 per 9 innings) since 1970, and their 517 total strikeouts ranked fifth for a single season in program history and led the Missouri Valley Conference. The staff ranked 51st nationally and second in the MVC with a 4.72 ERA.
Both Brandt Thompson and Garrett Ferguson picked up first-team all-MVC honors in 2023 and Hayden Minton was an honorable mention selection. Minton and Thompson ranked 2-4 in the league in strikeouts, while Ferguson was the only freshman on the MVC First Team and named a Freshman All-American by multiple publications after ranking fifth nationally among rookies with six saves. Jake Eddington went in the seventh round of the MLB Draft and Minton was selected two rounds later, giving the Bears multiple pitchers off the board in the first nine rounds for the fourth time in school history.
Petree previously served as the Bears’ student assistant during the 2016 season following the completion of his three-year professional career, and helped former Bear Jud Kindle resurrect the State Fair program in 2017 and 2018, leading the Roadrunners to 56 wins over a two-year stretch.
The most decorated player in Missouri State baseball history, the Clinton, Mo., Petree became the Bears’ first national player of the year (Collegiate Baseball) in 2012 when he was a consensus All-American and led the nation with a 1.01 earned run average. A right-handed pitcher, he turned in one of the most dominant mound performances in program history as a sophomore by logging 73 straight innings without surrendering an earned run. One year later, Petree was named to the ABCA’s Rawlings Gold Glove Team and became the first player in the history of the MSU program to earn All-America recognition in three different seasons, capping his Bears career with a 27-7 record and 1.76 ERA.
After being drafted by St. Louis in the ninth round of the 2013 Major League Baseball First-Year Player Draft, Petree embarked on a pro career that would see him advance as high as Double-A Springfield. Over 56 career appearances, he logged 17 victories while posting a 2.94 earned run average, including a 2014 campaign in which he went a combined 8-5 with a 2.52 ERA at three different levels.
Petree completed his undergraduate degree in business at Missouri State in 2016 and resides in Springfield with his wife, Victoria, and sons Jackson and Carter.
