UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. – Penn State baseball head coach Mike Gambino announced the addition of assistant coach Jake Palomaki to the Nittany Lion coaching staff.
Palomaki comes to Happy Valley after serving as a hitting coach in the Philadelphia Phillies organization, recently working with the FCL Phillies.
The Kennesaw, Georgia native played at Boston College, under Gambino, from 2015-18.
“I’m excited to be working under Coach Gambino again,” said Palomaki. “Thankful for the opportunity given to me by Coach Gambino, Dr. Patrick Kraft and Vinnie James. Excited to be working with this coaching staff. Penn State has a culture of winning across all sports. The baseball team has a good thing going. I’m looking forward to helping us to make some noise on the national level.”
“As a player, Jake brought competitiveness, toughness, grit and a work ethic that our guys will be able to learn from,” said Gambino. “He’s a tremendously high-character, high-integrity guy that will help our players grow and develop on and off the field with what he’s done as a player, working up to Triple-A and working as a hitting coach. He can bring tremendous value from a development side, helping our guys to win championships and develop into professional baseball players.”
After being selected in the 18th round of the 2018 MLB Draft, Palomaki played in the Tampa Bay Rays organization from 2018-21. He played in AAA with the Salt Lake Bees in the Los Angeles Angels organization in 2022.
In his minor league career, Palomaki collected 266 hits, 99 RBI and 169 runs.
Palomaki served as player development coordinator for Pinnacle Performance.
While at Boston College, Palomaki played in 196 games, making 192 starts. He tallied 202 hits, 91 RBI and 153 runs. Palomaki is Boston College’s all-time leader in career walks (153) and season walks (46; 2015), while holding second in career runs (153) and career steals (60), fourth in season steals (19, 2016) and seventh in career on-base percentage (.426).
He was named NCAA Regional All-Tournament Team in 2016 and served as a team captain in 2018.
In 2024, Penn State went 29-24 overall and 12-12 in Big Ten play. The 29 wins are Penn State’s most under a first-year head coach.
Penn State posted its first winning record in the regular season since 2016 (28-27) and maintained a .500 or better mark from the entire season for the first time since 2011 (32-22). The Blue and White notched its best record in Big Ten play since going 12-12 in 2016.
Penn State reached the Big Ten Tournament Championship Game for the first time since 2000 and won three-straight games to open the Big Ten Tournament for the first time in program history.