Former Terrapin letterwinner Kevin Kearns enters his 43rd season on the Maryland wrestling staff.
Kearns started at Maryland as a student in 1966. In 1970, while captain of the wrestling team, Kearns was drafted into the United States Army. He served with the 101st Airborne Division in a special operation unit known as a LRRP team (Long Range Reconnaissance Patrol) in Vietnam in 1971 and 1972. Upon his completion of military service, he returned to the Maryland wrestling program in 1972 and assisted Coach Sully Krouse and Coach John McHugh and the team.
Wrestling during this time for the Baltimore Central YMCA, Kearns won the National YMCA Greco-Roman Championship, the prestigious New York Athletic Club Greco Championship and two South Atlantic AAU Freestyle Championships.
After receiving his degree in Physical Education at Maryland, he moved to Minnesota to train and wrestle for the United States Greco-Roman team. Returning to Maryland in 1976, Kearns was named head wrestling coach at Dulaney High School in Timonium, Maryland.
In 1977 he was selected to take the head coaching position at Johns Hopkins University, but returned to the University of Maryland in 1980 where he served as an assistant coach for 27 years under John McHugh and Pat Santoro. In 2004, Kearns moved to the administrative assistant position where he has served to the present time.
In 2005 Kearns was honored by the University of Maryland wrestling program by naming the annual outstanding senior wrestler award as the "Kevin R. Kearns Award". In 2013 Coach Kearns was inducted into the National Wrestling Hall of Fame in Stillwater, Oklahoma.
