By CURTIS ROCKWELL/Sports Director

KILN — After spending 17 years in South Mississippi as a head baseball coach, Neil Walther spent this past season as an assistant at Oxford High.

However, as of Monday night, Walther is back home in the “Southern Six”.

Walther was approved as the new head baseball coach at Hancock High at the monthly meeting of the Hancock School Board. Walther was the head coach at nearby and region rival Pearl River Central from 2008 until mid-way through the 2024 season, when he was abruptly and unceremoniously dismissed from that post by the school administration.

“I would like to thank the Hancock administration for recommending me for this position and the board for approving me,” Walther said, in an exclusive interview with SouthMiss6 Sports Monday afternoon. “I am excited to get started and plan on meeting with the team tomorrow. A lot of coaches in the area as well as many former players have reached out in the past couple days and it is good to be back in South Mississippi. I think it will help that I am familiar with the teams in the region and after I spend some time with the team I will have a better idea of what we need to do and improve on in order field the most competitive team we can.”

Walther spent this past season as the pitching coach at Oxford High, helping lead the Chargers into the second round of the Class 7A North State playoffs. Before that, he was one of the most successful head coaches on the diamond in the “Southern Six” for most of the past two decades at PRC.

Walther spent almost 17 seasons in Carriere, and was the most successful head coach in any sport, by far, at Pearl River Central High School. Since the 2008 season, he compiled an impressive 329-169 record while winning seven district titles with 15 straight playoff appearances, three trips to the South State finals and a state title.

Walther led the Blue Devils to the Class 5A state title in 2017, which still stands as the only state championship in a team sport in school history. The Blue Devils, ironically enough, knocked off Oxford in three games in the title series.

No official word from PRC administration was ever released on his departure.

PRC qualified for the playoffs just three times in the history of the school before Walther arrived in Carriere. He has over 500 total wins as a head coach in 26 years. He came to South Mississippi after serving as a head coach in two other stops, one at Springs Valley High in French Lick, Ind., and also at Newburg High in Newburg, Missouri.

He replaces longtime Hancock head coach Anthony DeWitt.

DeWitt took over as head coach at Hancock before the 2008 season. He guided the Hawks to almost 190 wins since then, but Hancock hasn’t had a winning record since 2015.

Hancock finished this past season at 12-14 overall, and in fifth place in Region 4-6A, and did not qualify for the state playoffs. The Hawks lost their final four regular season games, including the last three to defending Class 6A state champion George County, to drop out of state playoff contention.