Kirk Olescyski

Coach Kirk was born and played football in Western Pennsylvania’s “Quarterback Cradle,” where Lujack, Unitas, Namath, Montana, and Marino were household names long before they entered the national spotlight.  He played receiver for the Neshannock High School Lancers, and could have played local, small-college football, but chose to attend Penn State University instead for its academics. 

While at Penn State he had the opportunity to begin studying the quarterback and linebacker positions with the assistant coaches.  He has continued to be a “student” and enthusiast of the game.  He completed his Bachelor’s degree in Exercise and Sport Science and then obtained a Master’s degree in Exercise Science with an emphasis in Motor Learning and Psychology from the State University of New York at Buffalo.  With a desire to live in a warmer climate, he moved to Los Angeles in 1993 and immediately began working in a Sports Medicine Chiropractic Clinic as a Rehabilitative Exercise Specialist and Personal Trainer.  Here he had the opportunity to work with a few of the Raiders during off-season.  Not one to pass on learning and teaching opportunities, he left L.A. in late 1994 for a temporary teaching position at LSU.

While at LSU, he taught Kinesiology classes, continued his study of the game, and also was an Academic Coach for the football, basketball, and track teams in LSU’s Academic Center for Student Athletes.  By 1996, he moved back to L.A., where he then began teaching Kinesiology classes at Cal State L.A. and Fitness Instructor Program classes at UCLA Extension.

He continues to be a Lecturer in Kinesiology at CSLA and since 2003 also at Cal Poly Pomona.  A few young, local football coaches have had classes with Coach Kirk as they have obtained their Bachelor’s degrees, and have gone on to coach at schools like Cathedral, Azusa, and Bell.

Having a stepson who played for the East L.A. Bobcats, Coach Kirk developed an affinity for the type of football played in the East L.A. area, claiming that the players and especially the fans are something special, very much like the same from Western PA.  Coach Kirk cut his “football teeth” in the WPIAL, Pennsylvania’s premier athletic league, and knows how seriously a local community can rally around their high school football team.  He sees this at CSHM, and is privileged to be a part of it.  His greatest desire is to impart not just football skill and knowledge to the young men, but the intensity, desire, and perseverance needed to achieve at a high-level academically and athletically.   Words like “work and discipline” are regularly emphasized by this young coach.  Coach Kirk expects great things in CSHM’s future.