Former Nebraska Baseball Coach John Sanders 1945-2022

It is with a heavy heart for us to report that former Nebraska head baseball coach John Sanders has passed away from cancer on Saturday, February 5th at the age of 76.

John was born in Grand Island Nebraska and was a multiple sport athlete for the Grand Island Islanders. He signed with the Kansas City Athletics out of high school in 1964. He started his pro career in the Appalachian League before getting called up to Kansas City in 1965. He only played one game before being traded to Boston. From there he bounced around the minor league system until his retirement in 1968.

John went on to get both his bachelors and masters degrees from Northern Colorado. His coaching career started at Arizona Western College before he ended up at Nebraska. He started out as an assistant in 1977 and took over the head coaching job in 1978 taking over for long time head coach Tony Sharp.

He spent 20 years as the head coach for the Cornhuskers. In that time frame he had nine 40 win seasons, 17 total winning seasons, three NCAA Tournament appearances (1979, 1980, & 1985), and almost one hundred players drafted into the majors. He was inducted to the Nebraska Sports Hall of Fame in 2002. His record at Nebraska was 767-453-1.

After his time at Nebraska he joined the Boston Red Sox organization where he spent nine seasons. From there he went to the LA Dodgers organization.

Our condolences to Johns family and friends.