Mary-Ellen Hall will enter her 17th year as Senior Woman Administrator at HCU. The SWA role is the highest ranking female in the HCU athletic department.
Her duties as SWA are to coordinate and/or provide support of all women's sports teams at HCU, attend home and away games and conference championships as appropriate to represent the department, participate in the hiring and evaluation of sports coaches, disseminate pertinent information to coaches, provide insight and information regarding women's issues and programming at all levels, as well as support for all women's programs, and represent HCU at Southland Conference and NCAA meetings and conventions.
Hall was HCU's Head softball coach for 35 years, retiring after the 2026 season. She is the winningest coach among all sports at HCU with 933 victories at her alma mater.
During her tenure as head coach, Hall has led the Huskies to nine NAIA national championship tournament appearances and national rankings, including the team’s highest final ranking of second in 2005, including the Huskies having their best record in school history in 2005 with 51 wins and setting a new low for losses with five.
She was named RRAC Coach of the Year in each year the Huskies competed in the conference and after the 1999 and 2005 seasons, NFCA honored her, along with assistant coach Roger Willhite, as NAIA Southwest Region Coaching Staff of the Year.
Hall then oversaw the transition to NCAA Division I, winning the great West Conference title in 2011 before moving into the Southland Conference in 2013. The Huskies advanced to the Southland Conference Tournament six times
Honored by the National Fastpitch Coaches Association for her 500th career win during the 2006 season, Hall picked up her 900th career victory during the 2024 season. She has had athletes selected All-America 32 times in her career, with 99 total All-Conference/All-Region nods spanning three conferences during her tenure
Academics has always been a high priority for Hall over the years. In total, there have been 150 Academic All-Conference and 94 Academic All-America accolades during her tenture. She has also had 97 NFCA All-America Scholar-Athletes in that span while also seeing her teams being awarded for excellence in the classroom by the NFCA.
Prior to taking over the reigns as head coach, Hall served as an assistant coach for three seasons. In her first year as an assistant, which also was the first year of HCU softball, the Huskies competed as a Division I member.
A 1988 graduate of Houston Baptist University, Hall received her Master’s degree in sport sciences from the United States Sports Academy in 1991. She was named to the HCU Sports Hall of Honor in 2012, and has had 21 of her former players earn induction as well.
Hall attended Marian Christian High School where she was a four-time all-district selection in softball and voted as the team’s Most Valuable Player twice. She played on summer softball teams that attended the state tournament five times and finished fifth in the nation in 1980. In addition to softball, Hall played basketball and volleyball at MCHS.
After high school, Hall attended HBU on a volleyball scholarship where she was a two-year letterman for the Huskies. Hall also served as assistant volleyball coach for her high school alma mater while attending HBU.
Hall enjoyed much success at HBU, building the Huskies into a perennial NAIA national power and overseeing a transition back to the NCAA Division 1 ranks. She has served as chairman of the Red River Athletic Conference and Region VI softball coaches and as a national rater for the NAIA. She also is a past president of the NAIA Softball Coaches Association.
