The unlikely coach who turned Friends men’s golf into a KCAC dynasty
Dustin Galyon was supposed to be done with coaching.
That was the plan, anyway.
After 12 years on the sideline as a college basketball coach, after 182 wins at Hesston College, after the bus rides and recruiting battles and late-night film sessions, Galyon believed he had reached the end of that part of his life.
His next chapter was already taking shape. Galyon, who had been delivering keynote speeches and leadership seminars since he graduated high school, was ready to lean fully into life as a motivational speaker, traveling the country to inspire coaches, athletes and students.
Then came the call Galyon never expected. Friends athletic director Rob Ramseyer wanted to know if he would want to coach men’s golf.
“That’s crazy,” he remembered telling Ramseyer, “because you don’t have a golf team.”
Friends had not had one since 2015. Ramseyer wanted to bring it back. And he wanted Galyon, a basketball coach by resume and a relationship-builder by nature, to be the one to breathe life into it.
Galyon did not say yes right away. He and his wife spent months thinking about it, praying about it, wondering if this unexpected door was really the one they were supposed to walk through.
Five years later, it’s impossible to imagine Friends men’s golf without him.
What began as a restart has turned into one of the most dominant programs in the KCAC. The Falcons have won four straight conference championships, produced the last five KCAC individual champions and are headed to the NAIA national championship for the fourth straight year.
The program that did not exist a few years ago is now ranked No. 10 in the country.
“I always told people that I was going to coach golf at 65, but it turned out that the Lord had other plans,” Galyon said. “I’m a firm believer that if God calls you, he’ll equip you, whether you feel like you’re ready or not. It was a big step of faith for us, but it’s been such a special place.”
That is the part of the story Galyon still seems to hold with wonder.
Friends did not hire him to continue a tradition. There was no stocked roster waiting for him, no established culture to inherit, no recent championship trophies to point toward.
The program had to be rebuilt from nothing.
And almost immediately, Friends started winning.
The latest proof came at the KCAC championship, where Trinton Nobles won the individual title with a four-round score of 3-under par and was named KCAC Player of the Year for the third straight season .Nobles continued a remarkable streak for the Falcons, who have claimed the last five KCAC individual titles through Nobles, Tomas Vazquez, Caleb Knight, Gerardo Alemany and Trenton Sutherland.
This year’s championship performance also showed the depth of what Galyon has built. All five Friends golfers finished in the top eight: Bernhard Koster (third), Gabriele Romani (fifth), Laken Matthews (sixth) and Jenson Boyce (eighth).
Galyon was named the league’s Coach of the Year for the fourth time. Koster was named Newcomer of the Year. Matthews was selected as Freshman of the Year. Nobles, Romani and Matthews earned first-team All-KCAC honors, while Koster was named to the second team. Grant Waggoner was chosen as Friends’ Champion of Character recipient.
The results look like the product of a perfectly timed rebuild. Galyon insists it never felt that way from the inside.
He did not arrive with a countdown clock for success. He did not tell himself Friends had to win a conference title by Year 2 or become a national tournament team by Year 3.
He focused on people first. The golf followed.
“We keep inviting the Lord to be active in our program,” Galyon said. “I don’t think God cares who wins or loses a golf tournament, but I do think we are called to do things with excellence and do them well. There’s been a huge faith component.”
That belief has shaped the way Galyon talks about his players.
He does not describe them only as golfers to develop, but as young men he has been entrusted to lead. He wants them to know he cares more about who they become than what they shoot. He wants the program to feel like a place where accountability and compassion can coexist.
That has become more than a talking point. Off the course, Galyon co-founded the Impactful Coaching Project with Ramseyer in 2024, an initiative focused on training coaches to develop the whole person.
It is also how Galyon explains the heart of the Friends program.
“When you’ve got a great coach next to you, you’ve got great players and you’ve got an unbelievable institution behind you, not only will good things happen, but great things are possible,” Galyon said. “We just keep loving on our guys and hopefully modeling for our guys what it means to have a community. I know I’ve needed a ton of grace and mercy in my life, so we try to extend that to our guys and try to be Christ-like in that way.”
There is a warmth to Galyon that makes the program’s rise easier to understand.
He is naturally buoyant, the kind of person who can make a conversation feel energized within minutes. It is not hard to see why he has spent much of his life speaking to audiences around the country. It is also not hard to see why families and recruits would trust him.
That may be the biggest reason Friends rose so quickly.
Galyon may not have entered college golf with a traditional golf-coaching background, but he arrived with years of recruiting experience from one of the toughest environments in college athletics: junior college basketball.
At Hesston, Galyon learned how to find players, build relationships and sell a vision. In 2015, he was named NJCAA District 5 Coach of the Year after leading the Larks to a Region 6 championship and a berth in the NJCAA Division II national tournament.
When he got to Friends, those same skills translated.
The Falcons have built an international roster with players from places like London, Switzerland, South Africa, Norway and Northern Ireland. They have also created a local pipeline through Maize South, where Maverick Guinn, Grant Waggoner, Laken Matthews and Colten Hoover all came from before joining the program.
Wichita itself has helped, too, with its strong golf community and access to quality courses giving Galyon something tangible to sell.
Then winning made the pitch even stronger.
Galyon said the current players have become some of the program’s most effective recruiters because they can tell prospects firsthand what it feels like to be part of Friends golf. Their experience has become the best advertisement for the next wave of talent.
The program took another step in 2023 when Chris Hamman joined the staff as an assistant coach. Hamman is well known in the Wichita golf community as the owner of Sticks 96 Golf and Putt 29 Golf, but Galyon refers to him as more than an assistant .He calls Hamman a co-head coach and credits his golf knowledge with helping elevate the program.
“Chris Hamman has forgotten more golf than most know, including me,” Galyon said. “I really do believe he is one of the best golf coaches in the country.”
That partnership has helped Galyon navigate a unique coaching transition.
In basketball, he could stomp the sideline, call a timeout, make a substitution or demand more effort. Golf required a different touch. A golfer standing over a six-foot putt does not need a coach telling him to try harder. He needs clarity.
While the sport changed for Galyon, the principles did not.
“A lot of coaches get to coach one sport for ‘X’ amount of years and then when that’s over, it’s over,” Galyon said. “I feel so blessed that I almost got a ‘do over’ in my coaching career. The basketball part was fantastic, but going from the sidelines to the golf course was wildly different in coaching. In basketball, I told guys all of the time to ‘try harder’ and now that’s the worst thing I could tell a golfer.
“But there are universal truths, no matter what you’re coaching, basketball, golf, tiddly winks. How do you treat your guys? Do you hold your guys accountable? How hard do you work? How do you communicate? How do you love guys through tough times?”
Those truths have carried Friends from a revived program to a national contender.
Now comes the next test.
The Falcons will compete in the NAIA national championship beginning Tuesday at TPC Deere Run in Silvis, Illinois, where they will try to turn their KCAC dominance into national noise.
“We’re taking it one shot at a time, one hole at a time and one round at a time,” Galyon said. “I really do think NAIA golf is as good as it’s ever been. The field is loaded. We’ve got a chance to make some noise if we play up to our potential, but if we don’t, we could be going home early. The field is that good.”
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