Mission College welcomes inaugural season wrestling head coach
SANTA CLARA – Mission College is pleased to announce former 3C2A All-American and State Champion wrestler Dustin Kirk as head coach of the inaugural season of wrestling at Mission.
"I appreciate the opportunity that Associate Vice Chancellor John Vlahos and Chancellor Brad Davis have given me," said Kirk, "and I'm looking forward to meeting everybody and working with everybody over at Mission. I know there's a lot of work ahead, and I'm excited to get to work, get it done, build a program, and show people that Mission College men's and women's wrestling is here, and can be competitive for a state championship in the next couple of years."
Kirk, who spent the last four seasons heading the women's program at Cerritos College, will lead the Monarch program in its first season. After winning four straight 3C2A championships, Kirk is excited to build another program from its base stages upward.
"I am all in with everything I do," said Kirk, "and I recruit a class to come in and make an impact. I'm leaving Cerritos at the pinnacle of its success, but my definition of success is to build something that isn't dependent on one individual. I'm leaving in a good spot, and now I'm excited to get to Mission and start building that exact same thing. I've already reached out to the community and talked to several coaches. I have an Excel list of every coach in a 45-mile radius. I know I have two months to build a team, and put a team on the mat to try to be successful, and although a lot of people are looking at this to be a building year, I do want to scratch the surface of success a little bit this year, whether that be an individual or two. I'm going to put everything I have in the next two months to build Mission College to be one of the best programs in the state, in the 3C2A, so I'm excited."
As a student-athlete, Kirk won the 3C2A State Championship at 133 pounds in his sophomore season at Cerritos and posted a 36-1 record after a 3rd-place finish at 125 pounds his freshman campaign. That success continued through his time at the four-year level at King University in Bristol, TN, where he and teammate Bryce Killian became the first two-time All-Americans in program history.
With his perspective as someone who has gone through the trials and tribulations of being a junior college student-athlete, Kirk is able to put himself in the shoes of a potential student athlete, something he feels gives him a coaching advantage.
"Truthfully," said Kirk, "I've had opportunities to coach at many different four-years, but I'm a 3C2A guy myself. One thing I find about the NCAA, it's about legacy. It's about giving those that are already successful an opportunity to chase a dream, which is a national championship, or whatever it may be. At the 3C2A level, one thing I love about it is: it's giving people opportunity, and it's giving people direction to chase something that maybe they didn't even know that they could chase, to get them to see the true value in themselves, and to break that psychological epidemic of not tying people's self to the results they have on a wrestling mat and getting them to understand that the content of their character is more important. You're helping discover people that may not have believed in themselves or they didn't realize they were good, but giving them the tools, and the guidance, and the support to understand that they are."
In conjunction with an already-successful women's basketball program, Kirk is excited to put Mission wrestling on the board and help grow the athletic community in Santa Clara.
"I think it's just about getting the campus and the community involved, involved as much as possible. I love the branding. I think for me, in a program, culture is everything. Giving people an opportunity to do what they love, regardless of economic status. I think it's getting out on campus and meeting students that might not be involved in wrestling, but maybe want to come and watch a wrestling duel, or whatever it may be. It's working in the end with basketball, and getting the institution and the students there to see Mission athletics as a whole, and creating unity there."
In any coaching job comes the need for strong communication, something Kirk feels he understands on a different level as a 3C2A athlete himself.
"I think that's a huge plus," said Kirk about his ability to connect with the 3C2A student-athlete. "For me, it's transparency always. I think it's talking to individuals as human beings and treating people as such. Entitlement is the biggest culture or program ruiner out there. Ensuring that the student athletes are part of the program at Mission will have gratitude. They will focus on their attitude and effort. They will treat people with respect, and they will understand that life is hard, it doesn't get easier, we just get better at dealing with it. We're talking to human beings, and nobody's better than anybody."
Mission begins its first season of men's and women's wrestling in the upcoming 2026-27 athletic campaign.