Crowder baseball coach Travis Lallemand inducted into Region 16 Hall of Fame

Jul. 12—Travis Lallemand took the helm of the Crowder College baseball program in 2006 with the intention of building a winning culture while making positive impacts on the lives of the players he coached.

Just 17 years later, the Crowder skipper is being recognized as one of the top coaches to ever compete in the Roughriders' region.

Crowder announced late last week that Lallemand has become the first coach in school history to be inducted into the NJCAA Region 16 Hall of Fame. He joins former right-handed pitcher Joe Boever, who pitched for the Roughriders and St. Louis Community College in the early 1980s, on the short list of Crowder representatives to be voted into the region's HOF.

"It's an honor," Lallemand said Monday. "I recently looked at the people who were already in (the hall of fame), and there are a couple of other baseball guys who had long, illustrious careers. To join those guys is incredible and a great honor."

Lallemand sports a 707-293 career record through his first 17 seasons as Crowder's head coach. He's led the Roughriders to seven Region 16 championships, four South Central District championships and four NJCAA World Series appearances.

Crowder has appeared in the NJCAA national poll in each season under Lallemand. The team has won 40-plus games in 11 seasons and also claimed three 50-win seasons since it made its first World Series appearance in 2010.

Lallemand credited his HOF induction to the players and coaches he's competed with over the years.

"I'm glad they think that much of the work that I've done," Lallemand said. "But like I always say, I've been blessed with good players and good coaches. This is kind of a program award more than it is an individual award for me. You never get into coaching for the individual recognition or stuff like that. I really got into this to make an impact on kids like the coaches that I had did. I keep in contact with some of those guys from back when I played. They definitely made an impact on me, and the goal for me has always been to make similar impacts with my guys.

"We win a lot of games with players while their here and do some very special things on the field, but the relationships are what remain once their two years are done. So I'm very proud of the relationships that have been developed with these guys and the trust that's been built."

Lallemand added that his coaching values and principles were heavily influenced by a pair of his mentors — former Labette County Community College coach Tom Hilton and former Girard, Kansas, highway patrolman and baseball historian Dan Smith.

"My junior college coach, Tom Hilton, was a huge impact on me," Lallemand said. "He coached at the University of Arkansas before coming over to Labette, where I played. He's been a huge, huge part of it all for me.

"Even before then, Dan Smith, who passed away last year, he made just as big of an impact on me with baseball and even things outside of baseball. His son, Danny, pitched in the big leagues with the Expos — that will tell you how long ago it was. Dan's other son, Dustin, is a scout around here with the Rangers. They're just a great baseball family that had a major impact on me. Probably from the early days, those two (Hilton and Dan Smith) were the two main guys who influenced me baseball wise at an early age. Obviously that list grew and grew over the years."

Lallemand has been successful at emulating that same type of mentorship for his own players. So far at Crowder, he has coached 48 Region 16 first-team awardees, 14 NJCAA All-Americans, six region players of the year and four Region 16 defensive players of the year.

Crowder has had 35 players drafted in the MLB as well as 120 players who moved on to play at the NCAA Division I level under Lallemand.

Lallemand began his Crowder career in 2002 as an assistant coach before being named the program's head coach four years later. Prior to his arrival at Crowder, he spent two seasons as an assistant coach at Labette.

The Girard native played college ball at Labette before transferring to Berry College in Rome, Georgia.

Contact Jared Porter on Twitter at @JaredRyanPorter.