Baseball: New Albany coach Dave Starling resigns

Dave Starling, who has led the resurgence of the New Albany baseball team into one of the state’s top programs in recent years, has resigned after six seasons.

New Albany athletics director Richie Wildenhaus confirmed Starling’s resignation in an email to ThisWeek on June 26 but did not elaborate on a timeline or reasons.

Starling, 68, has 531 career wins, 133 of which have been at New Albany since joining the program in September 2015.

He led the Eagles to the Division I state championship in 2021, the program’s second overall and first since 2004 when it was in Division III, and district titles each of the past four seasons. New Albany went 24-7 overall and 12-3 in the OCC-Ohio Division this year, losing to Grove City – with which the Eagles shared their second league championship in three seasons – 2-0 in a regional final.

Starling, who was named state Coach of the Year in 2019, won 398 games at Reynoldsburg from 1983-2009. A 1972 graduate of Reynoldsburg, Starling led the Raiders to the Division I state tournament in 2004 as well as two district titles and five league championships.

His players at Reynoldsburg included future major leaguers Eric Fryer and Mike Matheny.

dpurpura@thisweeknews.com

@ThisWeekDave