South Florida’s Mark Kingston is next South Carolina baseball coach

The University of South Carolina has their man. Mark Kingston, the head baseball coach at South Florida, will take the same position in Columbia, first reported by WFLA-TV’s Dan Lucas. The move will be announced today at 3pm.

Kingston is set to make $600,000 a year on a six-year contract, which includes a base salary and incentives. The university will pay USF $150,000 to buy out his contract there.

Under Kingston, the Bulls have made the NCAA baseball tournament in 2015 and 2017; their last appearance before his arrival was 2002. Before taking the reins in Tampa, he was the head coach at Illinois State, where the team qualified for regionals in 2010, his first season there. He also served as an assistant at Purdue (1997-1998); Miami (2000-2001), where the Hurricanes made a Super Regional in 2000 and won the College World Series in 2001; and at Tulane (2002-2008), helping the Green Wave to regionals in six out of seven years, Super Regionals in 2004, and the College World Series in 2005.

Florida’s Kevin O’Sullivan was considered a front runner, but after leading the Gators to their first College World Series title, he dropped off the board. Oklahoma State’s Josh Holliday, Indiana’s Chris Lemonis, Wake Forest’s Tom Walter, and even Clemson coach and former South Carolina assistant Monte Lee were considered serious candidates, but Ray Tanner has instead elected to look to the Sunshine State for Chad Holbrook’s replacement.

Here’s what our friends at SB Nation’s USF blog, The Daily Stampede, wrote about Kingston toward the beginning of the month.