Volleyball
- Title:
- Assistant Coach
- Phone:
- 972-415-4285
Career Records & Honors
Seasons Coaching:Â Fifth
Seasons At Mississippi State:Â Second
Career Record:Â 96-36 (.727)
Career Record At Mississippi State:Â 17-15 (.531) // 6-12 SEC (.333)
National Results:
- NCAA Appearances: 2 (2012-13)
- AVCA All-American: 1 (2014)
Conference Results:
- SEC Player of the Week: 1 (Alex Warren - Nov. 30, 2015)
- Academic All-SEC: 5 (2015: Shelby Anderton, Chelsea Duhs, Payton Harris, Ellen Stuart, Alex Warren)
- Southland Regular-Season Championships: 2 (2012-13)
- Southland Tournaments Championships: 2 (2012-13)
- Southland Player of the Year: 2 (2013-14)
- Southland Libero of the Year: 1 (2014)
- Southland Setter of the Year: 2 (2012-13)
- All-Southland Conference: 6 (All First-Team selections)
- Academic All-Southland Conference: 5 (Four First-Team)
Coaching Biography
Passion, energy and dedication. These are just a few things that John Newberry brings to the table and those were key in the success of the Mississippi State Bulldogs in his first season as an assistant in Starkville.
Newberry helped lead the Bulldogs to a 17-15 record in 2015, posting the first winning season at State since 2006. The 17 wins marked the most for MSU since 2006, while State's six SEC wins were the most since winning seven conference matches in 2011.
The Crossett, Ark., native serves primarily as the Bulldogs recruiting coordinator and has been instrumental in the Bulldogs signing a number of highly-touted recruits since arriving in Starkville. As soon as Newberry arrived, he went to work to help put together a signing class of seven Bulldogs that made a significant impact in 2015 and has three stellar signees joining the Maroon and White for his second campaign with State.
However, Newberry's reach goes far beyond the recruiting trail.
Along with wife Brittany Newberry and head coach David McFatrich, Newberry and the Bulldogs got off to a hot start, winning six of their first seven matches and 10 of their first 13, both the best starts since 2006. That impressive stretch to start the season also included two non-conference tournament titles (Maroon Classic and Tiger Invitational), marking the first time since 2010 that MSU had won multiple non-conference tourneys in a season.
In total, Newberry and the Bulldogs dominated the non-conference slate, winning 11 matches outside SEC play, the most since capturing 13 non-conference wins in 2000.
Under Newberry's leadership, the Bulldogs accomplished a number of impressive feats in SEC play, with the sweetest coming in the two matches against in-state rival Ole Miss. MSU first traveled to Ole Miss and snapped a six-match losing streak to the Rebels, claiming a sweep for the first time since 2006 against Ole Miss and for only the third time in Oxford (1975 and 2005). The Bulldogs then wrapped up their year by sweeping the season series, ending with a 3-1 victory against Ole Miss to clinch the winning season and marking the first back-to-back wins against the Rebels since 2009.
Newberry's guidance helped lead the Bulldogs to a number of other impressive SEC feats, including shutting down the other Bulldogs in the SEC twice in 2015. A sweep of Georgia on Oct. 11 snapped an eight-match losing streak to UGA and marked the first shutout of the Bulldogs from Athens since 1979. MSU would go on to sweep UGA again later in the year, marking the first season sweep and back-to-back wins against Georgia since 2006-07. It was also State's first win in Athens since 2010 and only the fifth in school history.
MSU would end the year with three-straight SEC wins, the first time that feat had been accomplished since 2007. Amongst those wins came a shutout of LSU at home which, coupled with a win last season in Starkville against the Tigers, marked the first time in school history MSU had won back-to-back matches against LSU in Starkville.
If Newberry's drive for success wasn't enough of an indicator, his growing knowledge of the game of volleyball left no doubt that the Bulldogs would make significant strides from 2014. With the help of Newberry and the State coaching staff, the Bulldogs made significant jumps in seven different offensive categories. After posting 1,269 kills (10.57 K/S) in 2014, the Bulldog offense improved to 1,393 kills (12.55 K/S) in 2015. Newberry's leadership also helped State make major jumps in its setting and serving games, going from 1,184 assists (9.87 A/S) and 115 service aces (0.96 SA/S) in 2014 to 1,308 assists (11.78 A/S) and 158 service aces (1.42 SA/S).
State made its biggest showing from the service line, where its 1.42 aces per set stood second in the SEC and its 158 total aces finished fourth. Leading the way for State from the service line was Evie Grace Singleton, who Newberry helped coach the previous two seasons at Central Arkansas. Singleton led MSU with 46 aces (2nd SEC, 26th NCAA) and a 0.43 aces per set average (1st SEC, 20th NCAA). State's star junior also stood top 10 in the SEC in kills (378, 6th), kills per set (3.53, 6th), points per set (4.13, 6th) and points (441.5, 8th).
The Newberry effect can be seen in the classroom as well. Behind his drive for his players to be successful in every aspect of life, the Bulldogs landed five players on the All-SEC Academic Honor Roll in 2015, which is the most on the team since MSU landed five in 2011. The Bulldogs posted a 3.44 GPA in the spring, which set a number of impressive marks, including the highest GPA amongst all MSU sports for the 2015-16 year. The spring semester GPA, led by seven players who posted career-best GPA's in that span, also marked the fourth-best semester in program history.
One Bulldog landed on the 4.0 List (Riley Duzenack), while four earned President's List honors (Duzenack, Emily Howard, Katie Nicholson and Ellen Stuart) and two placed on the Dean's List (Savannah Cressman and Chelsea Duhs).
The Bulldogs' home, Newell-Grissom Building, has also seen a number of improvements since McFatrich and the Newberrys' arrival, as State's locker room and playing court underwent major renovations and included the addition of a team film room.
The Newberrys were named to David McFatrich’s coaching staff at Mississippi State on January 15, 2015, rejoining McFatrich after serving as an assistant on his staff the previous three seasons at UCA.
“I’m very grateful that I have been able to bring my coaching staff, John and Brittany Newberry, with me to Mississippi State,” McFatrich said. “John and Brittany share not only my coaching philosophies, but my off-court priorities as well.”
“God has truly blessed us with some great accomplishments in the past and we cannot wait to carry this over to Mississippi State,” John Newberry said. “David McFatrich is a phenomenal leader and coach and we are grateful to be by his side to help these ladies win on and off the court. We look forward to sharing a winning tradition and mindset with all the other Bulldog sports.”
Central Arkansas Assistant Coach (2012-14)
Newberry comes to Starkville after spending the last three seasons on McFatrich’s staff at Central Arkansas. In that time, the Sugar Bears made consecutive NCAA Tournaments in 2012-13 and won back-to-back Southland Conference regular season and tournament championships, the first team in the league to do so in 23 years.
In that two-year span, UCA also went 59-9, the second-most wins in Division I during that period behind only the NCAA National Champions Penn State.
During his time on the bench at UCA, the Sugar Bears defeated several Top 25 teams, broke into the Top 45 nationally in RPI and maintained perfect Academic Progress Rate (APR) scores. Individually, he helped produce two Southland Conference Players of the Year, one Student-Athlete of the Year, two Setters of the Year, one Libero of the Year and seven First Team All-Southland selections. Last season saw UCA earn its first AVCA All-American in program history.
Conway Christian High School Assistant/Fatchmo Volley
John Newberry began his time in volleyball assisting his wife, Brittany, while she was the head coach at Conway Christian High School and a national coach for Fatchmo Volley. Newberry proved to be a quick learner, taking over his own team in 2012 at Fatchmo Volley and winning three gold medals at regional tournaments and placing third in a national qualifier.
Central Arkansas Football Punter (2000-03)
Newberry put together a decorated football career as a punter at UCA from 2000-03, earning Second-Team All-American, First-Team All-Conference and First-Team All-Region honors. He holds the second-highest career punting average in UCA’s 100-plus year history and earned UCA’s First-Team All-Decade award at punter for the 2000’s.
Personal
A native of Crossett, Arkansas, Newberry is a 2005 graduate of UCA with a bachelor’s degree in mass communication and a minor in speech communication. Newberry has worked as a full-time television producer for Mike Barber Ministries, a worldwide prison ministry, having overseen the production of television shows from inside prisons across the United States. Newberry is married to current MSU volleyball assistant coach, Brittany Newberry.
