Verdugo hired as AWC women’s soccer head coach

Verdugo elevated from interim head coach at AWC to full time head coach.

YUMA, Ariz. (KYMA, KECY) - Victor Verdugo has been named the next women's soccer coach at Arizona Western College.

Verdugo took the reigns as interim head coach for the Lady Matadors mid-season in 2023 and led them to the NJCAA national semi-finals, the best finish in program history.

"We're just really pleased," AWC athletic director Jerry Smith said. "Victor's a part of the community. Obviously, the job he did last year coming in in the middle of the season, moving our young young lady forward with the success. They had just seen him in action and his organizational skills and just working with the entire staff. I mean, Victor just seemed like the exact person to do the job."

Verdugo is a Yuma native and has set a goal of not only building on last seasons successes, but to better connect with the Yuma community.

"Where I think our program will continue to improve," Verdugo said. "It's just our connection within the communityI want our community to come to our games to identify with this team. To me, identify means that they know the players, that they see them out there in the community. It's something that we talked about. I call it us in the community, the community with us as far as we're going to put our team out there and the elementary's doing small camps to going to the missions, the food bank for our team to get those people to identify with the players, not just as soccer players, but to identify with them as people."

Verdugo is the sixth head coach in program history.