Energy, discipline, resolve.
Ask anyone who knows Blazer head baseball coach Greg Guilliams to describe the 34-year coaching veteran and you are likely to hear those three words in one form or another.
Since joining the Valdosta State program prior to the 2008 season, Guilliams has used the above character traits to vault the Valdosta State baseball program into the upper echelons of the NCAA Division II ranks. Driven by a seeming unending source of energy that fills a room whenever Guilliams enters, the Blazer head man has quickly added his stamp to the rich tradition that is Valdosta State baseball as he has recorded 501 wins against 323 losses and one tie, a winning percentage of .608. He has directed VSU to two of its four Gulf South Conference championships, a feat he accomplished in both 2010 and 2013, as well as a GSC East Division title in his initial season. Guilliams has led the program to a Top 25 national poll finish four different times. His overall collegiate coaching career has produced 1,178 victories against 580 losses and two ties.
Valdosta State's most recent success under Guilliams came in 2022 and 2023, where coach led the Blazers to back-to-back NCAA postseason berths in for the first time since 2009-2010.
The Blazers’ winning ways under Guilliams has led to a plethora of honors for Valdosta State players. Nine times a VSU player has earned All-America honors under Guilliams’ tutelage while the 2009 and 2010 NCAA Division II South Region and 2009, 2010 and 2012 Gulf South Conference Players of the Year wore the red and black. Additionally, the 2012 GSC Freshman of the Year was also a Blazer while a Valdosta State baseball player has earned All-Gulf South Conference honors 48 times in the last ten years. Meanwhile, multiple Blazers, including Matt Costello and Brandon Graves in 2009, and Brandon Decker in 2010, among others, have been selected in the Major League Baseball Amateur Draft. Guilliams himself benefited from the program's success, as he was named the Gulf South Conference Coach of the Year in 2010.
Guilliams began his tenure at VSU with a bang, leading the program to a 36-18-1 record and a Gulf South Conference East Division title in 2008. The Blazers compiled a 6-6 record on the season against teams ranked in the top 25 in the nation, including a 4-3 record against teams ranked in the top three, and finished the year ranked 16th nationally after falling to No. 2 Delta State in the GSC Tournament semifinals. Valdosta State posted a 10.5 game improvement from its 2007 record, when the Blazers were 27-30, a figure which marked the eighth-best turn around in the nation between the two seasons.
Guilliams took over the Blazer program after spending 16 seasons as the head coach at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University in Daytona Beach, Fla. During his tenure with the Eagles, Guilliams led Embry-Riddle to 661 wins, an average of 41 a year, against 256 losses and one tie, a .721 winning percentage. His program was particularly successful from 2000-07 as Embry-Riddle tallied a 377-108 record (.777), the best record by any team in the state of Florida, regardless of classification.The Eagles appeared in 11 NAIA regional tournaments, six NAIA College World Series, and earned a national runner-up finish in 2004 under the tutelage of Guilliams. That 2004 squad led the nation in pitching and defense, tallying a 2.67 team earned run average and a .966 fielding percentage, while the 2005 team accomplished the feat with a 2.62 ERA and a .970 fielding percentage. From 1994 through 2007, his program led the NAIA ranks in team ERA a total of five times and finished among the top 15 teams in the nation 13 times. A total of 44 Embry-Riddle players received All-American accolades under his leadership, including Frankie Thompson, who was named the 1996 NAIA National Player of the Year.
The long time coach was named the American Baseball Coaches Association Regional NAIA Coach of the Year six times while being recognized as FSC Coach of the Year on seven occasions. In 2003, the Florida Diamond Club chose Guilliams as its Amateur Coach of the Year.
Guilliams played collegiately at NAIA’s Ohio Dominican, where he earned his Bachelor of Arts in Education and History in 1984. He was a three-year captain and garnered NAIA All-American honors three times for ODC and was elected into the school’s Hall of Fame in the inaugural class of 1997.
Before he became a coach, Guilliams parlayed a collegiate career at Ohio Dominican into a professional contract with the Atlanta Braves organization. He spent one year in the team’s minor league system before kicking off his coaching career as a graduate assistant at Eastern Kentucky in 1987.
Guilliams was married to the late Ami Gregory. They have two sons, Elijah and Isaac.
