JUCO Hall of Famers: Rardin, Fournier discuss recent inductions

BOWLING GREEN, Ky. – This past season was a wild and memorable ride for WKU baseball and much of that is due to a pair of coaches on the staff who were recently honored for their time prior to the Hill.

“We don’t become who we are and we don’t arrive at Western Kentucky without Iowa Western,” said WKU Head Coach Marc Rardin.

Rardin spent 20 seasons at Iowa Western Community College and 934 wins later, he left as the winningest coach in the school’s history.

Making the trip to the JUCO World Series 12 times and winning three of those showcased the success that Rardin had established in Council Bluffs, IA, and now in 2025, Rardin has been named to the Iowa Western Athletic Hall of Fame.

“You know, you just want to leave things better than how you found it,” said Rardin. “When you look at where that place was when we got there to where it is now, it’s really cool to see it.”

The coaching staff just wouldn’t be complete without another legend of the game.

Assistant coach Rob Fournier, who was recently named to the Illinois Sports Hall of Fame, joined the Hilltopper staff in 2022 after a storied 26-year career as head coach at Wabash Valley College.

He left the program with 1,106 wins and 14 Great Rivers Athletic Conference championships, never seeing a losing season, and he shared what his favorite part of coaching is and what keeps him going each and every day.

“Watching your players develop is so important. From when they get there as a freshman to when they leave as seniors, or even if you have them for one year, watch them develop and become more confident in every aspect of the game and life,” said Fournier.  “I think that motivates me in every area of what I’m trying to do. Being around the right people and getting the most out of people is my obsession, to help better people, that is the name of the game for me and that’s why I’m still in it, and that’s why I’ll continue to be in it.”

Now looking back on the summer of 2022, the Hilltoppers struck gold with two of the top JUCO coaches in the nation who have since carried the winning tradition on here in Bowling Green.

After being represented for the first time in a while at the national level, the future of WKU baseball is brighter than ever.

“Coach Rardin and I competed against each other for so long, and then it became a friendship and then it became, ‘Alright, we can do this together’ type of thing. It was so fun for us to actually talk about it and visualize it, and from year one to two to three, we just kept getting better for the whole program, like this is what we wanted to do,” said Fournier. “That was so satisfying, and now it’s about where else can we take this program.”