Billy Phillips grew up in New Port Richey and played baseball at River Ridge High School. After high school he continued his baseball career at Pasco Hernando College and Florida Gulf Coast University. While at Florida Gulf Coast Billy was ranked in the top 10 nationally for strike outs per 9 innings along with compiling numerous single season and career records that still stand today. In 2005, Billy signed a professional baseball contract with the Boston Red Sox. After his time with the Red Sox he continued his playing career with multiple teams in the Frontier League and Northern League associations. Upon retiring from baseball Billy returned to FGCU where he was a volunteer assistant pitching coach working with multiple pitchers who are in the Major Leagues today.
Billy utilizes his extensive knowledge of body mechanics and kinesiology learned while playing baseball to instill proper hitting techniques to reduce the chance of injury. Due to his baseball background, Billy has a great understanding of the statistics of volleyball, identifying trends and studying historical data allows him the opportunity to pass along this knowledge to his players allowing them to understand the game on a deeper level. Although relatively new to coaching volleyball, Billy has been involved in coaching baseball for over 15 years at the Little League, High School, and College levels. In his first year with Elevate, he was an assistant coach on the 17-1’s team under Ashley Martin. Last year in his first year as a head coach with Elevate he led the 17-1’s to a 56th place ranking while taking gold medals 3 times.