SPRINGFIELD, Mo.— Drury University and the DU Athletics department is sad to announce the passing of former men's head basketball coach Jerry Kirksey.
 
In his lone season as Drury's head coach, Kirksey guided the Panthers to the 1979 NAIA National Championship and a 33-2 record. Drury won the District 16 title that year with an 85-61 win over Rockhurst, and took the national championship on March 17, 1979, with a 60-54 victory over Henderson State at Kemper Arena in Kansas City.
 
Kirksey arrived at Drury in 1977-78 as an assistant coach and took over the program one year later when Dr. Edsel Matthews stepped down to become the Director of Athletics for the Springfield Public Schools. As a member of the Drury coaching staff in '77-78, the Panthers went 29-4, were ranked number one in the NAIA at the end of the regular season, and advanced to the national quarterfinals. 
 
Originally from Halfway, Missouri, Kirksey had a prolific high school basketball career starting as a freshman at Halfway High School before moving to Buffalo High School, where he was a two-time all-state performer. He started his collegiate career at Missouri, then transferred to Missouri State as a sophomore and played three seasons for the Bears from 1959-61. Kirksey was a part of Missouri State's NCAA-II national runner-up squad in 1959 and a team that went 23-3 while winning the MIAA championship. He was a two-time MIAA All-Tournament selection and ended his three-year playing career at Missouri State just shy of 1,000 career points with a total of 973.
 
Kirksey's coaching career started at the high school level, where he compiled a 146-52 record through eight years with stops at Weableau, Stockton, and Houston. He coached Houston High School to three sectional titles in five years and had the team ranked number one in the state during his tenure.
 
Kirksey moved to the collegiate level in 1970 and was the head baseball coach and assistant men's basketball coach at Missouri S&T. As an assistant coach for the Miners, he helped his team to six winning seasons in the MIAA and two national tournament appearances. In 1972, Kirksey's baseball team won the MIAA and advanced to the NCAA-II Central Regional.
 
Following his year as Drury's head basketball coach in 1979, Kirksey became the head basketball coach at Henderson State, where he took the Reddies to two NAIA national tournaments and a national quarterfinals appearance in 1982. He returned to the Ozarks and his native Polk County to become the head basketball coach at Southwest Baptist in 1987. In five of his nine seasons as head coach of the Bearcats, his teams were nationally ranked, and his 1991 squad won the MIAA with a 15-1 league record. Kirksey led SBU to two NCAA-II tournament appearances, a regional championship and an Elite Eight appearance in 1991. In 13 years as a collegiate head coach, he posted a record 246-124, had six 20-win seasons, and had five national tournament appearances with three of those teams advancing to the national quarterfinals or better.
 
Jerry Kirksey was inducted into the Missouri State Athletics Hall of Fame in 1999 and was enshrined as a member of the Missouri Basketball Coaches Association Hall of Fame in 2018. 
 
An announcement on memorial services for coach Kirskey is forthcoming.
 
 
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