Kirk Hunter

Biography

Now in his 17th year as Wichita State's head cross country coach and assistant track and field coach, Kirk Hunter has maintained one of the top distance programs in the Midwest. Hunter has coached at the collegiate level for 36 years, serving as the Colby Community College head coach from 1988-2000 and the Butler Community College head coach from 2000-09 before taking over as Wichita State's distance leader in 2009. He was named the NJCAA Coach of the Year 22 times between his men's and women's cross country and track and field teams' successes, coaching 274 athletes to a total of 674 NJCAA All-American honors and 45 Honorable Mention honors. He coached 50 individual national champions and 79 runner-up national finishers, claiming six NJCAA team championships and seven NJCAA second place team trophies. Hunter served as President of the NJCAA DI Cross Country Coaches Association from 2000-05 and Vice President from 2005-08 and was inducted into both the Colby Community College and NJCAA Coaches Hall Fame. Since joining the Shockers in 2009, Hunter has coached 37 All-Americans, 84 individual conference champions and has led Wichita State to two cross country conference team titles, the first being the 2010 Missouri Valley Conference Women's Championship and the most recent being the 2018 American Athletic Conference Women's Championship. He was named the MVC Women's Cross Country Coach of the Year in 2010 and has coached eight conference cross country Runners of the Year, four