Primarily a reliever at Washington State, Connor was 11-3 lifetime, capped by a senior season in which he was 5-1, with two saves and a 3.53 ERA, helping the Cougars advance to the NCAA tournament for the second year in a row.

A graduate of River Ridge High School in Olympia, Lambert was a first-team all-state selection, the Pac-9 Conference MVP, the Olympian newspaper's Player of the Year, and a member of the Tacoma News Tribune newspaper's all-area team as a senior.

He majored in sociology at WSU and was a graduate assistant coach there in 2011.