Kortney Cunningham enters her first season as the Head Volleyball Coach at Friends University.
Cunningham comes to Friends after a four-year tenure as the head coach at Lyon College, an NCAA Division III program in Batesville, Ark. While at Lyon, she guided the Scots to consecutive United States Collegiate Athletic Association (USCAA) National Runner-Up finishes, including a 20-9 record in 2024 that marked the programâs first 20-win season since 2019. During her tenure, Cunningham coached three USCAA All-Americans and the 2024 USCAA Player of the Year.
Prior to Lyon, Cunningham served as an assistant coach at Northwestern Oklahoma State University for three seasons. In 2019, she helped the Rangers post a second-place finish in the Great American Conference (GAC) with a 23-11 record. Throughout her time at NWOSU, the program earned consecutive AVCA National Team Academic Awards, including a cumulative team GPA of 3.620.
A native of Almena, Kan., Cunningham began her collegiate playing career at Hesston College, earning second-team all-region honors before transferring to Kansas Wesleyan University. At KWU, she was named First-Team All-KCAC and Second-Team All-Region while helping lead the Coyotes to a regular season conference championship in 2017 and finishing the season first nationally in blocks per set. She was also part of the 2018 KCAC Team Champion of Character Award-winning team.
Cunningham earned her Bachelor of Arts in Exercise Science from Kansas Wesleyan University in 2019 and completed a Master of Education in Management and Administration from Northwestern Oklahoma State University in 2021.
