Witzke Takes Over NIACC Baseball Program
MASON CITY, Iowa – Chris Witzke has been selected as the NIACC head baseball coach.
Witzke, who was the ICCAC coach of the year at Iowa Lakes in 2026, takes over for interim head coach Tyler Brown.
"What stood out throughout our search process was Coach Witzke's passion for developing young men, his vision for building a championship-caliber program and his commitment to helping student-athletes succeed both on the field and in the classroom," NIACC athletic director Ryan Flickinger said. "He understands what it takes to recruit, develop talent, create a positive culture and prepare players for success at the next level."
Witzke, who was the head coach at Iowa Lakes since 2023, said NIACC's strong athletic tradition attracted him to the position.
"NIACC takes pride in the student experience, the competitiveness of not just the baseball team, but all of its athletic programs," Witzke said. "On top of that, Mason City is a great city that has a lot to offer. From afar, it's always been apparent to me that the community takes a lot of pride in their NIACC Trojans."
In Witzke's four years at Iowa Lakes, the Lakers increased their run per game total each season.
In 2023, the Lakers averaged 3.7 runs per game. In 2024, they scored 3.81 runs per contest.
In 2025, Iowa Lakes scored 5.47 runs per game and last season they averaged 8.42 runs a game.
"My strengths as a coach would be on the offensive side of things," Witzke said, "as well as overall team defense.
"We take a lot of pride in putting together tough at-bats and being a tough out at the plate. In my time at Iowa Lakes, we rose our teams batting average and on-base percentage both nearly 100 points over the course of 3 years. We also set school records in our overall teams fielding percentage."
Last season, the Iowa Lakes baseball team was involved in a tragic bus crash on Feb. 11 that resulted in one death and injuries to 32 other passengers.
The Lakers' season was put on hold for over a month, but they returned to play the ICCAC season.
"I'm not sure I can even put into words the heartbreak and the devastation we faced," Witzke said. "I'm thankful for our players' toughness and resilience.
"Once we resumed our season, our main focus was to not be defined by being victims of a tragedy but rather be defined by how we responded and played from that point on."
Witzke, who was an all-region performer at DMACC in 2017 and also earned all-league honors at Harding University in 2022, said he's looking forward to getting started at NIACC and is excited about NIACC having a baseball field with artificial turf on campus.
"Weather plays a major factor in our league," he said, " knowing that, we will have every opportunity to be on our field and playing in front of our fans once the weather allows it will be a luxury NIACC has never had.
"Knowing our student-athletes will have a state-of-the-art facility literally right in their backyard will make day to day operations run smooth and it will only add to the day to day experience of being a Trojan. I am already looking forward to the opportunities for the greater community to use our complex as well."