Three-Time NJCAA National Champions Success Built on more than Beautiful Florida Sunshine

Photos courtesy Florida SouthWestern State Athletics

Robert Iamurri turned down the opportunity to move into the college coaching ranks so he could be a travel softball coach for his 8-year-old daughter Ryan. Nearly a decade later, Iamurri was in a better position to make the jump from highly-successful high school coach to head coach of the new Florida SouthWestern State program.

“I wanted to coach my daughter first,” said Iamurri of the decision.

Formerly Edison State College with no athletics program since 1997, the junior college was rebranded Florida SouthWestern State College in 2014 and athletics was restarted in 2015.

“I looked at it. It was less money than I made at work,” said Iamurri, who had already produced a Hall of Fame coaching career at Naples High School where he won a state record 817 games and 12 state championships from 1986 to 2014. “My daughter was a senior so that made the decision fairly easy. It was less money than (working at) Budweiser but it had good health insurance and I would be at the ballpark every day.”

That decision has paid off handsomely for the Buccaneers program. In eight seasons at Florida SouthWestern State, Iamurri has won 408 games and the last three National Junior College Athletic Association Division I national championships.

In The Beginning

Iamurri did not even have a softball field to aid in the recruitment of his first team.

“That first group was being recruited while our own field was still a baseball field,” he said of the City of Palms Park facility in Fort Myers.

Instead, Iamurri leaned into what he could sell to players to give the junior college level a serious look.

“I’ve got palm trees, white beaches and 70 degree weather in February,” he said with a big laugh.

Iamurri also had a track record for developing players like his own daughter, who played at Alabama and is now a coach with the Crimson Tide handling player development, and Jackie Traina, who helped Alabama win the 2012 national championship and was named the Women’s College World Series Most Outstanding Player.

“I try to tell them (recruits) our objective is to find athletes not completely skilled but good athletes who missed their window,” said Iamurri. “You can go D1 or be a preferred walk-on but if they are not paying you, do you want to be $200,000 in debt?

“By going Juco, many of our kids get out debt free. We can put together a good financial package for out-of-state kids. You are playing and getting developed within the good competition on our team.”

And that development can create options down the road for a player.

“It’s a financially better option at first, and you get the playing time working with our kids,” said Iamurri. “It’s an outstanding option to develop and we get a lot of people interested in our players. We’re not sending kids to the same schools because all their needs are different.”

Team One

Iamurri built Florida SouthWestern State’s first team in 2016 around a core of talented players from his home state and three international players from New Zealand.

“They happened to be pretty good,” said Iamurri, who has used a steady influx of international players over the years to bolster his roster. At one time he had four pitchers on his roster from four different continents.

In his third game with Florida SouthWestern State on the very first day of the 2016 season at the JUCO Kickoff Classic in Clearwater, Fla., the patchwork Buccaneers defeated Chipola College, the defending NJCAA national champions.

That was a sign of good things to come for the program. The wins piled up through February before the Buccaneers lost three games in four days to College of Central Florida and State College of Florida. From there, the program won its next 24 straight games to roll into the middle of April.

That momentum carried into the postseason where a 3-2 win over Seminole State College of Florida in the FCSAA State Tournament secured the first berth in the national championship tournament in St. George, Utah.

The Buccaneers defeated San Jacinto-South, 6-1, then suffered a 5-4 loss in 15 innings to Butler Community College (Kan.) and an 8-6 loss to McLennan Community College to close out their inaugural season at 53-16.

The Program

Iamurri has taken the Buccaneers to the national tournament every year but one during his tenure. And that Florida SouthWestern State squad that didn’t advance finished 54-3.

“We had one bad inning and lost to Chipola (2-1 in 9 innings),” he recalled. “We run-ruled everyone else.”

With the strength of junior college softball in Florida, the Buccaneers are always battle-tested when they reach the national tournament.

In 2021, Florida SouthWestern State ascended to a new level. Following the shortened, COVID-affected 2020 season, Iamurri had a loaded roster that rolled to the program’s first national championship.

“Offensively, we were a well-balanced team,” he said. “We had three pitchers and a couple of good power hitters. It was a combination of a well-balanced team.”

Only two starters returned in 2022 and the pitching staff was new but the program kept finding ways to win, finishing 56-6 and capturing a second national title with a pair of wins over McLennan.

The 2023 team helped Florida SouthWestern State make history becoming just the second NJCAA Division I team to win three straight national titles.

The Buccaneers started the season 12-3 then never lost a game in March, going 23-0, including four wins over top-20 ranked Division II programs.

The win streak carried into April and grew as high as 32 consecutive victories before falling to No. 14 Indian River twice on April 19. The Buccaneers never lost again.

Florida SouthWestern State closed the regular season with three straight wins then scored 23 runs in three games to capture the FCSAA State Tournament.

At the World Series in Oxford, Ala., the Buccaneers rolled to wins over Gaston College (5-2), No. 10 Seminole State (2-1), No. 5 Grayson (5-0), No. 1 Odessa (11-0) and, finally, No. 6 Northwest Florida State (10-6) in the national championship game, to become just the second team to win three straight NJCAA Division I titles, joining Central Arizona who won five straight from 1988-1992.

Feline Poot delivered a three-home run, six-RBI game for Florida SouthWestern State in the title game to close out her FSW career with the tournament MVP award. The three-time All American was recently named to the FSW coaching staff.

In eight years with the Buccaneers, Iamurri has gone 408-48. His seven conference championships matches his amount of conference losses (126-7). He has coached 30 First Team All-State selections, 18 NJCAA All-Americans and two NJCAA National Pitchers of the Year.

In Iamurri’s own words, seeing the players have success means so much more than winning titles.

“I’m more into doing this for them,” he said. “That’s what I love about this. If they’re not successful, I’ve failed.”

That success can come in many forms, even moving players on to another level.

“What I enjoy seeing, what both of us (assistant coach Kellie Webb) enjoy seeing, and what the coaching staff enjoys is the opportunity of filling the gap for the players that got missed or haven’t developed yet,” he said.

And the program has grown at such a rapid pace that Florida SouthWestern State now has its own synthetic turf field on campus.

“It’s a great facility and we’re still adding to it,” said Iamurri. “It’s an all-turf field. We are the only Juco in Florida with an all-turf field.”

Lofty goals

So can the Buccaneers keep chasing Central Arizona’s 30-year-old record of five straight national championships?

“We are thin. We could add some (players),” admitted Iamurri. “I think were solid with what we have but a couple of pieces could give us more options.”

Over the years Iamurri has added to the recruiting pitch. He can now offer the opportunity to play for national titles on a brand new field but he can still revert to his original, time-tested appeal of southwest Florida – palm trees, white beaches and 70-degree weather in February.

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