Robert Hiegert

Content sourced from Wikipedia, licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0.

Robert J. Hiegert (February 17, 1942 – June 19, 2025) was an American college baseball coach and athletics administrator at California State University, Northridge (CSUN). He was the Matadors’ head baseball coach from 1967 to 1984, making him CSUN’s longest-serving and winningest coach. Under his leadership, CSUN won two NCAA Division II national championships (1970 and 1984) and he was named National Coach of the Year in 1984.

Hiegert grew up in Sherman Oaks, California, and attended Notre Dame High School before playing college baseball at San Fernando Valley State College (now CSUN). A four-year starting shortstop from 1960 to 1963, he helped the program its first winning season in 1960 and was named Athlete of the Year. He earned a bachelor’s degree in 1964 and a master’s degree in 1968. After a stint in the Los Angeles Angels organization, he returned to CSUN as a coach and then became head coach in 1967. His teams earned 11 NCAA Tournament berths, eight conference championships, five regional titles, 14 winning seasons, and eight College World Series appearances, with CSUN finishing in the top three nationally five times and a runner-up in 1972. In his final season, CSUN went 46–1 and captured its second Division II national title.

After coaching, Hiegert served as CSUN’s athletic director beginning in 1984 and later as commissioner of the California Collegiate Athletic Association (CCAA) from 1997 until his retirement in 2013. He helped CSUN move from Division II to Division I in 1990. In 1992, he faced public criticism amid allegations of racial insensitivity within the athletics program; an independent report concluded there was no evidence of racial discrimination in department policies, though it urged improvements in student-athlete academic support. Hiegert was inducted into the CSUN Athletics Hall of Fame in 1998, as well as the CCAA Hall of Fame and the American Baseball Coaches Association Hall of Fame. In January 2025, CSUN renamed its home baseball facility Robert J. Hiegert Field in his honor. He was married to Jackie, whom he met at Valley State. Robert Hiegert passed away on June 19, 2025, at age 83.