Bio

Mark Eldridge, who started the Palomar softball program in 1978 and compiled a 1,083-304-6 record in 31 seasons before his retirement as head coach, returned as an assistant to one of his former Division I scholarship players, Lacey Craft, when Craft was hired as the Comets’ head coach.

Eldridge guided the Comets to 28 conference championships and state community college titles in 1989, 1993 and 2000 before retiring as the Comets’ head coach. Since he reunited with Craft as her first coaching hire, Palomar has added two more state titles in 2013 and 2015 and was runner-up in the 2018 state tournament.

Eldridge was honored as conference Coach of the Year 30 times and California Community College Coach of the Year three times. He also coached the National Teams of Spain and Canada from 2001-2006.

He was inducted into the National Fastpitch Coaches Association Hall of Fame in December 2012 in the same induction class as NCAA Division I coaching legends Patty Gasso of the University of Oklahoma and Donna Papa of the University of North Carolina.

Together, Eldridge, Gasso (1,158 wins in Division I entering the 2019 season) and Papa (1,203 wins in Division I enterting the 2019 season, plus 161 wins on the community college level before that) have amassed 3,605 college coaching victories.

Eldridge was a star three-sport athlete (football, baseball and track & field) at Palomar from 1967-69, was a starting safety for Washington State University during the 1969 season, then transferred to Long Beach State where he was a javelin thrower.

He received his Bachelor of Arts Degree from Long Beach State in 1973 and his Master of Arts degree from United States International University in 1976 and was an assistant professor in the Department of Kinesiology at Palomar until he also retired from that position.

Along with his teams’ softball state titles, Eldridge coached football at Palomar for 25 years, 24 as an assistant coach and defensive coordinator for Tom Craft (Lacey Craft’s father) and one season (1996) as head coach. He was defensive coordinator on Craft’s 1991 staff, when the Comets won the California State Championship and was named National Community College Champion by the J.C. Grid-Wire.

He also was an assistant coach in men’s track & field under the late Doc Marrin for three seasons, including the Comets’ State Championship season in 1977. Eldridge was the first javelin coach for the Comets’ Tom Petranoff, teaching him the event. Petranoff was a converted baseball player who went on to break the World Record in the javelin twice. 

Eldridge also was Palomar’s first women’s golf coach, from 2007 until 2013, and guided the Comets to the 2011 California Community College State Championship.

Mark Eldridge and his wife, Carla, live in Valley Center. Their son Ricky is a 2018 graduate of the University of Southern California Gould School of Law. Eldridge has two other grown children. Rebecca was an all-state softball selection for the Comets' 1999 team that went 44-14 (15-0 in conference) and went on to pitch on a softball scholarship at Abilene Christian University, and son Ryan.