Joe Sheridan, who played baseball for the Knights from 2017-2020, enters his first season on Coach Wallace’s staff after most recently serving as the interim head baseball coach at Siena College. Sheridan will serve as UCF baseball's director of player development.
“It’s fantastic to have Joe back home here at UCF," Wallace said. "He learned a wealth of knowledge over the last couple of years and we know that he will do stellar things for our program. We can’t wait for him to get to work as our director of player development,”
A former four-year southpaw pitcher and Freshman All-American for the Knights, Sheridan went on to finish his collegiate career with a year in South Bend where he pitched the 2021 campaign for the Notre Dame Fighting Irish. Upon completing his collegiate eligibility, he then spent the fall of 2021 as the director of player development with the Cincinnati Bearcats, before moving to Siena College as an assistant coach. After spending the 2022 campaign and the first-half of the 2023 season as the pitching coach and recruiting coordinator for Siena, Sheridan was then promoted to the program’s interim head coach following the retirement of longtime head coach Tony Rossi.
Despite facing a challenging schedule ahead of him, Sheridan helped lead the Saints to 12 victories over the competition during the second-half of 2023 at Siena, which included a win over 2023 NCAA Tournament team and MAAC Tournament champion Rider and another against two-time defending Southern Conference champion Wofford.
While in Loudonville, Sheridan aided in both the recruitment and development of a youth movement, which yielded MAAC All-Rookie Team honors for a pair of Saints. He also helped six of Siena’s seven returning pitchers improve their respective ERAs from the previous season.
During his first season with Siena, Sheridan helped standout hurler Ben Seiler earn the program’s inaugural National Collegiate Baseball Writers Association Dick Howser Trophy National Co-Pitcher of the Week award after Seiler set a 2022 NCAA single-game high with 19 strikeouts against Niagara.
Sheridan also previously spent the past two summers as a scout for Perfect Game USA, where he attended scouting showcases for high school players.
Sheridan, who hails from nearby Oviedo, Florida, advanced to the NCAA Tournament twice during his collegiate career—advancing to the NCAA Regionals as a freshman at UCF in 2017 and the NCAA Super Regionals at Notre Dame in 2021. He also helped the Knights capture a conference title in 2017 (AAC) and another for the Fighting Irish in 2021 (ACC).
Sheridan earned a bachelor's degree from UCF in human communication with a business and professional track in 2020 and master’s in management from Notre Dame in 2021.