All Sooners

Report: Oklahoma Assistant Takes Head Coaching Job

Skip Johnson aide Clay Van Hook is is leaving Norman to be the man in charge at UT-Arlington, according D1Baseball's Kendall Rogers.

John E. Hoover

Report: Oklahoma Assistant Takes Head Coaching Job
Report: Oklahoma Assistant Takes Head Coaching Job /

Oklahoma baseball coach Skip Johnson reportedly needs a new assistant coach.

Clay Van Hook, the Sooners’ hitting coach and third base coach during their memorable 2022 season, is expected to be hired as the head coach at UT-Arlington.

That’s according to D1Baseball’s Kendall Rogers, who reported the news Thursday on Twitter.

Van Hook instructed an OU lineup that produced four .300 hitters — Tanner Tredaway (.370), Peyton Graham (.335), Jimmy Crooks (.305) and Blake Robertson (.300) — and reached numerous standards on the way to a Big 12 Tournament championship and a College World Series runner-up finish.

OU this year hit its highest home run total (73) since 2010.

Van Hook spent five seasons as an OU assistant coach, joining the Sooners following a six-year stint at Rice.

He played for Johnson at both Navarro Junior College (2004) and at the University of Texas (2007). He transferred to UT from Navarro after his freshman season and spent three years playing for Augie Garrido in Austin, where Johnson was hired as pitching coach in 2007. 

Clay Van Hook
Clay Van Hook :: John E. Hoover / AllSooners

As a sophomore in 2005, Van Hook earned second-team All-Big 12 honors. In 2007, he was drafted by the Seattle Mariners.

From 2012-17, Van Hook was on the coaching staff at Rice under long-time head coach Wayne Graham.

Before that, he served as an assistant coach at McNeese State for three seasons from 2009-11.

Van Hook earned his degree at Texas in 2008 while serving as a student assistant coach.

Published
John E. Hoover
JOHN E. HOOVER

John is an award-winning journalist whose work spans five decades in Oklahoma, with multiple state, regional and national awards as a sportswriter at various newspapers. During his newspaper career, John covered the Dallas Cowboys, the Kansas City Chiefs, the Oklahoma Sooners, the Oklahoma State Cowboys, the Arkansas Razorbacks and much more. In 2016, John changed careers, migrating into radio and launching a YouTube channel, and has built a successful independent media company, DanCam Media. From there, John has written under the banners of Sporting News, Sports Illustrated, Fan Nation and a handful of local and national magazines while hosting daily sports talk radio shows in Oklahoma City, Tulsa and statewide. John has also spoken on Capitol Hill in Oklahoma City in a successful effort to put more certified athletic trainers in Oklahoma public high schools. Among the dozens of awards he has won, John most cherishes his national "Beat Writer of the Year" from the Associated Press Sports Editors, Oklahoma's "Best Sports Column" from the Society of Professional Journalists, and Two "Excellence in Sports Medicine Reporting" Awards from the National Athletic Trainers Association. John holds a bachelor's degree in Mass Communications from East Central University in Ada, OK. Born and raised in North Pole, Alaska, John played football and wrote for the school paper at Ada High School in Ada, OK. He enjoys books, movies and travel, and lives in Broken Arrow, OK, with his wife and two kids.

Home/Baseball