First-year head coach Lacy Prejean announced on Tuesday the addition of Melissa Mayeux to the softball coaching staff entering the 2024 season.
Mayeux reunites with Prejean after the two spent three years together as player and coach for UL Lafayette where Mayeux garnered Sun Belt Player of the Year honors in 2022.
“We are very excited to welcome Melissa to the NSU softball family,” Prejean said. “Melissa was an incredible student-athlete to coach, and I look forward to having her on our staff. She brings incredible work ethic and will be a tremendous asset to our program in helping develop both our defense and offense.”
A native of Le Barcares, France, Mayeux was a do-it-all utility player in her three seasons with the Rajun Cajuns, playing seven different positions on the field, including all five infield spots, while maintaining a near .300 batting average and .900-plus OPS at the plate.
In her Sun Belt Player of the Year senior season of 2022, Mayeux rose to the top of UL’s impact player list during a nine-game stretch in late March where she hit .440 with four home runs, a pair of doubles and nine RBI.
From that point forward she led the Cajuns in average (.336), runs (35), hits (42), doubles (12), home runs (6), RBI (29) and fielding percentage (.989) over a 28-game span to secure the Sun Belt’s top honor of the season.
Her award-winning season capped a career that included a total of 42 extra base hits, with at least one of each kind in each of her three seasons, accounting for nearly half of her 89 career hits. She also drove in a total of 75 runs and scored 74 across 129 games played and 110 starts as the Cajuns won back-to-back conference titles in her final two seasons in Lafayette.
“It’s an honor and a privilege to be coaching at NSU and with coach Lacy,” Mayeux said. “My whole life I have been passionate and dedicated to help others through baseball and softball. I look forward helping each girl become better players but most importantly better individuals.”
A highly decorated player before ever arriving in Louisiana, Mayeux was a member of the French U-18 Junior National baseball team and at the age of 14 was accepted into one of only two baseball academies in France.
Two years later she became the first female player to be added to Major League Baseball’s International Registration List, thus making her the first female player eligible to be signed or drafted by an MLB club.
After deciding to play softball collegiately in the States, Mayeux began her career at Miami Dade College where she was a two-time All-Southern Conference player, led the team in average both years, hitting .431 during her sophomore campaign, and had 14 home runs, 31 doubles and 90 RBI in two seasons.
Mayeux joins third-year pitching coach Lexi Smith to complete the softball coaching staff under Prejean.