Tairia Flowers

Tairia Mims Flowers (born January 9, 1981) is an African-American former collegiate All-American, medal-winning Olympian, softball player and current head coach at Loyola Marymount.^[1][2][3] She played college softball as a third baseman for the UCLA Bruins from 2000 to 2003, winning a national championship in 2003 and ranking top-five in school career RBIs and home runs.^[4] Flowers also helped them to two runner-up finishes and was named a three-time All-Tournament honoree.^[5][6] Flowers won a gold and silver medal as part of Team USA at the 2004 Summer Olympics and 2008 Summer Olympics.^[7][8]

Tairia Flowers

Flowers in 2008
Current position
Title	Head coach
Team	Loyola Marymount
Conference	WCC
Biographical details
Born	(1981-01-09) January 9, 1981 (age 44) Tucson, Arizona, U.S.
Playing career
2000–2003	UCLA
2005	Arizona Heat
Position(s)	First base, catcher
Coaching career (HC unless noted)
Softball
2006	UC Riverside (asst.)
2007–2010	Long Beach State (asst.)
2011–2020	Cal State Northridge
2021–present	Loyola Marymount
National team
2019	USA Women's Softball (asst.)
Head coaching record
Overall	259–263 (.496)
Tournaments	NCAA Division I: 0–2
Accomplishments and honors
Championships
As player: Women's College World Series (2003) 2× WCWS runner-up (2000, 2001) Pac-10 (2002) As head coach: Big West (2015)
Awards
First-team NFCA All-American (2003) Second-team NFCA All-American (2001) 2× first-team All-Pac-10 (2001, 2003) Second-team All-Pac-10 (2002) 3× WCWS All-Tournament (2000, 2001, 2003)
Medal record Women's softball Representing the  United States Olympic Games 2004 Athens Team competition 2008 Beijing Team competition

Early life and college career

Born Tairia Mims in Tucson, Arizona, Flowers graduated from Salpointe Catholic High School in 1999 and played on the UCLA Bruins softball team from 2000 to 2003 at first base and catcher.^[9] Helping UCLA make the championship game of the 2000 Women's College World Series, Mims hit .600 for the series and made the All-Tournament team.^[9] UCLA also were runners-up in the 2001 Women's College World Series and won the 2003 Women's College World Series. Flowers was a first-team NFCA All-American and first-team All-Pac-10 honoree in 2003.^[10]

College Statistics

Sources:^[11][12][13]

YEAR	G	AB	R	H	BA	RBI	HR	3B	2B	TB	SLG	BB	SO	SB	SBA
2000	59	160	23	48	.300	32	9	0	8	83	.518%	12	17	1	1
2001	68	213	54	80	.375	71	17	2	18	153	.718%	17	25	3	3
2002	64	189	34	68	.360	55	13	4	16	131	.693%	26	10	1	1
2003	61	178	49	80	.449	70	22	1	17	165	.927%	26	28	7	7
TOTALS	252	740	160	276	.373	228	61	7	59	532	.719%	81	80	12	12

International career

As a member of the United States women's national softball team beginning in 2001, Flowers won gold at the 2002 Women's Softball World Championship, 2003 Pan American Games, 2004 Summer Olympics, 2006 World Cup of Softball, and 2007 Pan American Games and silver at the 2008 Summer Olympics.^[14]

Professional playing career

In 2005, Flowers played for the Arizona Heat of National Pro Fastpitch.^[14]

Coaching career

In 2006, Flowers was an assistant coach at UC Riverside. From 2007 to 2010, Flowers was an assistant coach at Long Beach State, during which Long Beach State made the NCAA Tournament in 2008 and 2009.^[14][15]

Beginning in 2011, Flowers became head coach at Cal State Northridge. Upon the conclusion of the COVID-19 shortened 2020 season, Flowers had an overall 259-263 record, with her first winning season in 2014 with a 31–26. She is the second-winningest coach in CSUN history.^[16] In 2015, Flowers led Cal State Northridge to a 41–17 record (16–5 in the Big West Conference) with an NCAA Tournament appearance and the program's first sole Big West title.^[15][17] In fall 2020 Flowers was named as the head coach at Loyola Marymount University.^[18]

Personal life

She is married to Jason Flowers.

Head coaching record

Sources:^[16][19]

Statistics overview

Season	Team	Overall	Conference	Standing	Postseason
Cal State Northridge Matadors (Big West Conference) (2011–present)
2011	Cal State Northridge	22–31	10–11	5th
2012	Cal State Northridge	10–42	5–16	T–8th
2013	Cal State Northridge	25–31	11–13	T–6th
2014	Cal State Northridge	31–26	8–13	6th
2015	Cal State Northridge	41–17	16–5	1st	NCAA Regional
2016	Cal State Northridge	34–22	14–7	2nd
2017	Cal State Northridge	31–22	11–10	T–2nd
2018	Cal State Northridge	23–36	8–13	6th
2019	Cal State Northridge	26–28	10–11	5th
2020	Cal State Northridge	16–8	0-0	-----
Cal State Northridge:		259–263 (.496)	93–99 (.484)
Total:		259–263 (.496)
National champion         Postseason invitational champion         Conference regular season champion         Conference regular season and conference tournament champion       Division regular season champion       Division regular season and conference tournament champion       Conference tournament champion