Laura Taylor

Laura Taylor is an American softball coach and former player. From Hockessin, Delaware, she was an all-state catcher in high school before playing college softball for the Seton Hall Pirates as a catcher and first baseman from 2002 to 2005. She was the national home runs leader as a freshman and went on to break the school record with 59 career home runs, a mark that ranks in the top 20 in NCAA Division I history. Taylor was the Big East Conference Player of the Year as a senior and helped Seton Hall to two NCAA Tournament appearances. She was also selected to participate in the 2004 Olympic Team trials for softball. In 2005,Taylor played professional fastpitch softball for the New York/New Jersey Juggernaut in the National Professional Fastpitch League (NPF), the world's top professional fastpitch league at that time, and was named NPF Player of the Week for two consecutive weeks. In 2026, she was inducted into the Delaware Sports Museum and Hall of Fame.

Early life Taylor is from Hockessin, Delaware. Her father, Jeff, played catcher and pitcher and was selected in the 1978 MLB draft by the New York Yankees. Her uncle, Steve, Jeff's twin brother and also a pitcher, was a first round pick of the Yankees in the 1977 draft and later a politician. Taylor batted .483 as a senior in 2001 and was unanimously named first-team all-state.

Prior to her senior season, Taylor committed to play college softball for the Seton Hall Pirates. As a freshman at in 2002, Taylor was the NCAA Division I leader in home runs with 18, also breaking the Seton Hall single-season record, which was 15. She also led the team with 37 RBIs and batted .331. Taylor said, "It's purely the fence, the fact that they can't back up as far as they want to. I haven't changed my swing at all. I used to hit singles and a lot of doubles. There weren't fences and I wasn't fast. Teams always played me deep, so most of the time I would hit it in front of them and get singles or hit it in the gaps and get doubles, maybe a triple if I was lucky."

Taylor helped Seton Hall to a regular season record of 37–12 with an appearance in the Big East tournament as a sophomore in 2003. She appeared in 51 games and led the Big East with 13 home runs, also recording a batting average of .307 with 42 RBIs while being named Seton Hall's Sophomore of the Year. In 2004, she posted 14 home runs and helped Seton Hall to their first Big East championship along with an appearance in the NCAA Tournament. Taylor concluded her collegiate career with 59 home runs, two times more than anyone else in school history and a mark that placed in the top 10 in NCAA Division I history at the time her Seton Hall career ended. She also posted 160 RBIs, a Seton Hall record, and 180 hits, second in school history, while ranking in the top 10 in school history with a batting average of .309 and 33 doubles, in addition to breaking the Big East home runs record. She was also a candidate to represent the United States at the 2004 Summer Olympics, although she was not selected for the final roster. Taylor worked for the Red Storm for four years and then for three years with the Jacksonville Dolphins. She also started a training center in Jacksonville, Florida, known as Five-Tool Training.

Taylor was inducted into the Seton Hall Athletics Hall of Fame in 2019. In 2026, she was inducted into the Delaware Sports Museum and Hall of Fame.