Volleyball
- Title:
- Athletic Trainer
- Email:
- mcdonnelld@missouri.edu
- Phone:
- 882-2375
- Joined Mizzou:
- 1982
- Hometown:
- Platte City, Mo.
- Alma Mater:
- Missouri, '82, '86
Eric McDonnell continues his storied tenure with the University of Missouri Sports Medicine staff beginning his 34th year with the program. McDonnell, a native of Platte City, Mo., was a student athletic trainer at Platte County R-III High School. He holds two degrees from the University of Missouri: a bachelor's degree in secondary education (Health and Physical Education) in1982, and a master's degree in educational administration in 1986. As a student athletic trainer at Mizzou he was a recipient of the Dr. James M. Baker Award in 1981 for the outstanding student athletic trainer in the Mizzou Sports Medicine Program.
Following a five-year term as a student athletic trainer for the Tigers, McDonnell was hired as a full-time member of Mizzou's Sports Medicine staff. McDonnell served 19 years as the primary assistant with the football program before joining the women's basketball program in 1998. Currently, he oversees women's volleyball, in addition to his sport assignments, administrative duties have included teaching a variety of athletic training courses offered at Mizzou from 1988-1996, and had coordinated medical coverage of the Show-Me State Games from their inception in 1984-2000.
McDonnell has had an active role in a variety of governing organizations of the profession of athletic training, at multiple levels. He was the Missouri Athletic Trainers Association President from 1997-1999, Secretary-Treasurer 1993-1995. Later chairing the organization's Governmental Affairs Committee from 2000-2008 McDonnell worked to convert the state practice act from registration to licensure. In June of 2000, McDonnell was awarded Missouri Athletic Trainer’s Association’s Glenn L. McElroy, MD, Distinguished Service Award - named for Mizzou's longtime team doctor, as well as in 2007 the Missouri Athletic Trainer’s Association Athletic Trainer of the Year award.
Advancing from the state ranks to the district and national levels McDonnell served as the NATA District Five President from 2006-2011. At the national level, McDonnell has served on the National Athletic Trainers Association Governmental Affairs Committee from 2003-2006 and served as the NATA Governmental Affairs National Chair from 2006-2011. From 2011-2015 McDonnell began a term on the NATA Board of Directors representing District Five.
McDonnell is certified by the National Athletic Trainers Association and licensed as an athletic trainer by the Board of Healing Arts in the state of Missouri. He was inducted in the Missouri Athletic Trainers Association Sports Medicine Hall of Fame in 2003, the Mid America Athletic Trainers Hall of Fame in 2013. McDonnell was a NATA Service Award Winner in 2002, the NATA’s Most Distinguished Athletic Trainers Award in 2010, and the National Athletic Trainer’s Hall of Fame in 2016. McDonnell has also received training through MU's Law Enforcement Training Institute (LETI), and is a commissioned reserve police officer for the Weatherby Lake Missouri Police Department, a suburb of Kansas City, Missouri.
He is married to the former Sabrina Batterton of Auxvasse, Mo. They are the parents of a daughter, Madison, 20, and a son, Grant, 15.
