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 Sam DiMatteo

Baseball ∙ Center

Sam DiMatteo grew up in Center Township playing football, basketball, and baseball. At Center High School, Sam lettered three years in football and, in baseball, lettered each year and made All-Conference three times (2003, 2004, 2005). In 2005, Sam was named Baseball Player of the Year by the Beaver County Times, was named WPIAL Class AA Player of the Year, and was named to the All-State team.

From 2007 to 2010, Sam played baseball at California University of Pennsylvania, where he majored in business marketing. For the Vulcans, Sam was a four-year starter, three-time first-team All-Conference for the Pennsylvania State Athletic Conference (2008, 2009, 2010), two-time first-team All-Region (2009, 2010), and National Collegiate Baseball Writers Association All-American (2009 third team, 2010 honorable mention). Sam helped lead the Vulcans to win the 2010 PSAC Championship and was named the tournament's Most Valuable Player after going 10-for-17 (.588). Sam set all-time CalU records for hits (223), runs (175), and steals (115), with the 115 steals also setting a PSAC record, which as of 2023 remains CalU and PSAC records. Sam finished his college career with 31 home runs and 161 RBIs, which were respectively second and third in CalU history. In 2010, the Vulcans qualified for the NCAA Tournament.

In 2009, Sam played for the Florence Red Wolves and made the National Coastal Plains League All-Star Team. In 2011, the Washington Nationals invited Sam to spring training. Sam then played outfield in independent leagues, with the Ruidoso Osos (2011), Trinidad Triggers (2013), Fort Worth Cats (2014), Old Orchard Beach Surge (2015), Long Island Ducks (2015), and Sonoma Stompers (2016), finishing his independent league career with a .317 batting average in 628 plate appearances across 174 games.

Since his playing days, Sam has coached baseball. Starting in 2017, Sam served as batting coach for the Palm Springs Power, which won the California Collegiate League Championship in 2017 and 2019. Sam has managed the Arrowhead LumberJacks, which won the Power Summer Collegiate League Championship in 2019 and 2022. Sam was an assistant coach for the College of the Desert Roadrunners in 2018 and 2019, and, in 2020, Sam was promoted to head coach. In 2022, Sam's Roadrunners won the Inland Empire Conference, their first conference title in 51 years, and Sam earned the Coach of the Year honors from the Conference, a first for the College of the Desert.

Sam founded the non-profit SD Project (www.thesdproject.com) with the mission to keep sports dreams alive for at-risk athletes worldwide who face financial, mental, or physical struggles. In 2019, California University of Pennsylvania awarded Sam a Humanitarian Award, and, in 2020, Sam was inducted into the California University of Pennsylvania Athletics Hall of Fame.