Bruins Golf Coach Secures Coach of the Year Honors

UCLA Bruins gold head coach Armen Kirakossian was awarded the 2025 NCAA Division I Golf Pride Grips West Region Coach of the Year Tuesday by the Gold Coach Association of America (GCAA).

This is Kirakossian's first ever West Region Coach of the Year award and was named a finalist for the 2025 NCAA Division I Coach of the Year award as well.

Kirakossian, in his third season, led the Bruins to three titles in 2024-25. The first one being The Preserve Golf Club Collegiate in Carmel, California in the fall where UCLA outlasted 13 other programs. In the Spring, Kirakossian led them to beat 30 other teams at The Goodwin, which was hosted at Stanford University. And lastly, Kirakossian and UCLA rounded out the year winning the Big Ten Championship in Baltimore in April.

These three titles were the first three of Kirakossian's career with the Bruins, which started in 2022.

Along with Kirakossian, here were the other regional coach of the year winners: Princeton coach Will Green won in the Northeast, Virginia coach Bowen Sargent won the East, Florida coach JC Deacon won in the Southeast, Marquette coach Steve Bailey won in the Midwest, and Oklahoma State coach Alan Bratton, who led the Cowboys to win the NCAA Division I title Sargent and Virginia, won in the Central region.

Kirakossian led a few Bruins golfers to some notable seasons this year. Most notably, seniors Pablo Ereño and Omar Morales made first team All-Big Ten Conference and were unanimous selections at that.

Ereño was also named the Big Ten Conference's Male Golfer of the Year. Freshamn Baylor Larabee was named Freshman of the Year under Kirakossian as well. Ereño went on to place sixth in the NCAA Championships.

Prior to being named head coach at UCLA, Kirakossian was Arizona State's associate head coach for two years and an assistant for three. He helped the Sun Devils make the NCAA Championship four consecutive years which included a second-place finish in 2021-22 and a third place finish in 2020-21.

Kirakossian was a winning pedigree and he proved it by being names the West Region Coach of the Year in just his third season leading the program.

Make sure you follow on X (Twitter) @UCLAInsideronSI and @cmorenoNBA and never miss another breaking news story again from us.

Please let us know your thoughts on the bracket when you like our Facebook page WHEN YOU CLICK RIGHT HERE.