For WVU Potomac State College women's basketball coach Larry Kruk, coaching is a “team effort.”
“Everything we do is always about the team, the other coaches, and the entire athletic department,” he said. “We function as a team, and we accomplish things as a team.”
Kruk was recently named the NJCAA Region 20 Women’s Basketball Coach of the Year for the 2025–26 season, highlighting a historic year for the Catamounts program.
“In his seventh season at the helm, Kruk guided Potomac State to one of its most successful campaigns in recent memory,” said Potomac State College athletic director, Mandi Larkin. “The Catamounts finished as the NJCAA Region 20 runner-up while surpassing the 20-win mark for the first time under Kruk’s leadership.”
The 2025–26 season also etched its place in the program record books, as Potomac State recorded its highest win total since the 2010–11 season.
“The milestone campaign reflects the steady growth and development of the program under Kruk's direction. Kruk, who now holds a 90–64 career record at Potomac State, has consistently elevated the Catamounts into a competitive force within Region 20,” said Larkin. “His tenure has been highlighted by sustained success, including a Region 20 Championship during the 2020–21 season.”
For Kruk, the distinction is the culmination of a 15-year-old coaching career. A 2005 graduate of PSC, he later studied physical education at WVU in Morgantown. He began as an assistant coach for PSC when he worked in the maintenance department on campus in 2010. As his career advanced and he took on his current role as admissions counselor, so did his responsibilities in athletics. In 2018, he was named head coach.
This is his first time being honored on this level.
“Until something like this happens, you really don’t think about it,” he said. “A coach is there for the players not for your own personal accolades. For me, coaching is about getting the job done and being a good influence on the students and the athletes. If they didn’t do their job, I wouldn’t be able to do mine.”
Kruk said being honored by the NJCAA is humbling and more a cause for reflection than celebration.
“Something like this is always a group effort,” he said. “We don’t use the letter ‘I.’ It’s about the team itself and the assistant coaches. We function like a family. No one is above anyone else. And so, when I think about this honor, I think about what has gone into it, the players, the other coaches, and the athletic department here.”
Kruk said sports have always played an integral and important part of his life.
“Basketball is very personal to me,” he said. “Even as a kid, I would play basketball when things were stressful. Basketball has always been a stress reliever.”
Kruk said in addition to the staff and student athletes at PSC, his family has also always been supportive in his athletic endeavors. He said he is also appreciative to his own coaches in his past who paved the way and set an example of professionalism and sportsmanship.
“I still call my former coaches Coach. I never look at my former coaches and call them anything but Coach. That’s how much I respect them still,” he said. “I have learned a lot from previous coaches. There’s a great Ted Lasso quote that says, ‘It’s never the wrong thing to do the right thing’ and I live by that.”
Larkin said this latest honor recognizes not only the team's achievements on the court this season, but also Kruk's continued commitment to building a culture of excellence within the program.
“WVU Potomac State College Athletics congratulates Coach Kruk on this well-deserved honor and a remarkable 2025–26 season,” Larkin said.